Sami Malik, Founder, Linear Health
Sami Malik is the founder at Linear Health, and also writes on topics he is passionate about like technology and mental health care.
What is care management? Definition, benefits & examples
Chronic illnesses have a massive impact on everyday life, whether you live with one yourself or not. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reports that of the $4.5 trillion in annual healthcare expenditures in the US, 90% are for individuals with chronic physical and mental health conditions. Clearly, a lot of time and resources are already spent managing chronic care needs. Effective care management systems enable healthcare organizations to lower those costs and simultaneously improve health outcomes. But what is care management, exactly, and what does it entail?
Table of contents
Share article
Care Management Defined: The Basics
The term “care management” can refer to a collection of services, strategies, and activities that help patients living with chronic conditions manage their health needs. Care management systems also help healthcare providers work together to ensure that patients have the support they need to take charge of their health.
The overall goal of any management technique is to improve patient health outcomes. In doing so, organizations can often address internal obstacles, lower the demand for high-cost health services, and boost patient engagement rates.
Reduced costs for patients and providers alike can also be a natural result of all of these positive changes.
How Care Management Works
The best care management systems require a team effort. Patients and clinicians must come together to establish healthcare goals and see them through. This approach recognizes that the most sustainable health outcomes are those that are driven, in part, by patient engagement and activation.
Treating conditions or symptoms in isolation often means ignoring the other factors that can influence patient health. However, with a system for managing the progression of care, providers can get a bigger picture of what changes may need to be made to create long-term results.
Care Management Examples: Strategies for Providers
To ensure that all parties involved can work together to achieve goals like those above, care management programs might incorporate elements such as:
- Comprehensive and tailored patient care plans
- An established, dedicated care team
- Medication management options
- Training and educational materials for patients
- Standardized record-keeping and data-driven insights
- Protocols for coordinating care with community-based service providers or in-home care
- Tools to facilitate communication between patients and providers, like patient messaging platforms
Key Benefits of Care Management Systems
It’s worth it to invest in tools that help you maintain a strong care management system. The benefits of a solid strategy are impossible to ignore, especially as you scale your organization and begin to work with more patients.
Enhanced Visibility
When everyone involved in the care process has a clear image of what’s going on, their actions will be far better suited to long-term success.
For instance, a patient with a physical health condition like diabetes may also face other challenges, such as depression or difficulty maintaining a health-friendly diet. Increased visibility about each of these health needs enables long-term care providers to understand how they interact.
It also makes it far easier to offer guidance tailored to each patient. Perhaps visiting a dietitian who can recommend yummy and simple meals could help promote healthier eating and self-confidence, thus addressing all areas of need at once.
Better Clinical Outcomes
The result of better visibility is often better health outcomes, as patients can receive care that addresses the full spectrum of factors that impact their chronic conditions.
Effective care management also enables providers to dedicate more resources and time to preventative and supportive care measures.
Reduced Costs
No more duplicated testing, high hospitalization rates, or excessive treatment costs. When patient care is effectively managed, it gives those with chronic conditions the support they need to avoid serious health issues.
Finding Care Management Solutions for Your Team
Overall, care management systems are a natural extension of the care process. In other words, you’re likely already doing a lot of what might fall under the umbrella of “care management.”
However, getting organizational decision-makers, providers, and patients to sign on to your plan is key. To bring everything together and ensure that all stakeholders involved in chronic care treatment are on the same page, you need the right tools.
A patient communication platform like Linear Health can help you begin to build a care management system that suits your organization. Having a dedicated space for your teams to log information, create or access paperwork, and communicate can help you ensure you have the framework in place to get the full picture of patient health needs.
Linear Health is built to help behavioral healthcare professionals manage and provide the quality of care their patients deserve. To learn more about our platform and how it can help your teams, reach out to us today.
Share article
About the author
