A Policy Study on Development of the Integrative Application of Cross-hospital Case Management in Healthcare Organizations.

According to the definition of World Health Organization, Taiwan will be named as an aged society in 2017.The number of multiple chronic disease patients are surging by population aging over years. The integrative application of cross-hospital case management in healthcare organizations became significantly importance while elderly consumed majority of national health care which also derived quality care and cost control problems. National Health Insurance (NHI) administration has launched the “NHI family physician integrated health care program” in 2003 and continued to implement it until now. The patient-centered integrated outpatient care program has started in 2010, encouraged hospitals to provide integrated care by payment incentive. These good quality and appropriate medical services could avoid unnecessary or repeated medications or procedures by collaboration of multiple specialties. The patient referral system also could be established to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of care. Therefore, it is critical for healthcare organizations continuously develop the integrative application of cross-hospital case management to fit patients need. Three affiliated hospitals of university will be the subject of our study. We will use university database to analyze patients who has received cross-hospitals case management. The field study will be conducted to review how hospital effectively provided geriatric medicine, dementia and high three diseases (blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol) services by using EHRs and innovative smart healthcare application. The Chronic Care Model (CCM) will be used by expert interview and focus to group collect clinicians’ opinions about national health insurance and long-term care. A conference will be held to discuss how information and communication technology to improve the services of case management and propose a feasible policy study report. The purposes of our study are: 1. The comparison of the integrative application of cross-hospital case management in healthcare organizations between foreign countries and Taiwan. 2. To explore how EHRs and innovative smart healthcare application are effectively using in cross-hospital case management. 3. To propose a feasible policy study report how information and communication technology could improve the services of case management.