A necessary but often cumbersome process that can affect care access is prior authorization (PA). In a recent interview, the host asked me why there is so much pain in the PA process.
In the typical prior authorization process, each medical service is treated separately due to our current fee-for-service healthcare system. Patients and doctors want to collaborate on the entire care journey, but the legacy PA approach focuses on standalone moments of care. This causes practices to spend more energy on PA administration and less time focused on patients.
Rethinking the process will have a profound impact on care journeys. For example, patients in underserved communities may face transportation challenges, making multiple doctor visits problematic. Innovations like bundled or episodic authorizations could both eliminate the need to fit in another doctor visit and improve adherence to their care plan.
How do we reduce these disparities? In a word: technology. In more than a word? Well, check out the podcast and I’ll tell you all about it!
Featured Content
December is a busy month. Take a break for a few minutes and listen to Gina Kim’s interview with Urban Health Today. You’ll learn how prior authorizations can disproportionately impact underserved and minority communities and how technology can be harnessed to improve the situation.
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