Humana Inc. (HUM) recently inked an Accountable Care agreement with Boulder Community Health, a regional health system having facilities throughout Boulder and Broomfield counties. The deal aims at providing enhanced and coordinated healthcare to the population buying insurance in Boulder County.
Insured people in Boulder County will now be able to benefit from superior quality care through Connect for Health Colorado and Humana commercial health maintenance organization (HMO) health plans. Members of Humana will be able to access the inpatient, outpatient and emergency care services at Foothills Hospital and Boulder Community Hospital and also at the urgent care center, physician offices and special medical services at Mapleton Center and Community Medical Center. On the other hand, more than 128 primary care physicians and specialists affiliated with Boulder Community Health being in-network to Humana members at present are expected to make the delivery of enhanced patient care all the more hassle free.
The new partnership will help Humana provide care on a more personalized level to its members. Notably, Humana will be able to strengthen its individual preventive care, chronic conditions and disease management services that should in turn help it attract more members.
Under an Accountable Care agreement, health and wellbeing companies, and physician practices come forward to collaborate and establish an Accountable Care Organization (ACO). An ACO utilizes each others’ resources and expertise to provide coordinated high quality care to patients at lower costs.
Establishing a more coordinated health system is of utmost importance and is quite an issue in recent times. Many healthcare organizations are coming together these days and forming ACOs to address this issue. Particularly for Humana, in Colorado, this issue is a point of focus. Thus, by partnering with Boulder Community Health, Humana intends to utilize its strong integrated model and expertise to create a system that works in a more coordinated way.
Humana boasts a 26-year long Accountable Care history which involves above 1.2 million members and 38,000 primary care physicians. It has been setting up ACOs over a long period to enhance patient care for its MA members. Earlier this month, the company entered into an Accountable Care agreement with Aurora Health Care to cater to its MA members throughout eastern Wisconsin and northern Illinois.
Humana currently carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). Other favorably-ranked stocks in the health maintenance organization (HMO) space that look attractive at current levels include UnitedHealth Group Incorporated (UNH), Anthem, Inc. (ANTM) and Centene Corp. (CNC). While Centene sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), Anthem and UnitedHealth have the same Zacks Rank as Humana.
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