Solucient Establishes Combined Managed Care, Employer Business Unit; NGS American, Inc. Among Clients Benefiting from Move 2/5/2004
From: Tarsis Lopez of Solucient, 847-440-9619 or tlopez@solucient.com EVANSTON, Ill., Feb. 5 -- Michigan-based third- party administrator (TPA) NGS American, Inc. is the first customer to benefit from a decision by Solucient(r) to join its employer and managed care businesses to create a combined "payer" unit serving the needs of health plans, TPAs, employers, consultants, brokers, and business coalitions. NGS, which specializes in claims administration services for large companies with self-funded group medical, dental, and disability plans, will now be able to provide its clients access to Solucient's Comprehensive Health Care Analysis and Management Program (CHAMP(tm)) and use CHAMP to offer clients claims analysis services that identify key medical care and cost utilization issues. "As the principal payers and providers of health care benefits in the United States, managed care organizations (MCOs) and employers share a number of goals and desires, such as understanding health care needs and providing cost effective care options. Most importantly, however, they are passionate about providing high quality, cost-effective health care for patients, " said Joe Bisson, senior vice president of Solucient's Payer unit. "With the creation of our new 'payer' unit, we can better understand the continuum of health care needs for customers (employers) and their health care service providers (MCOs) to facilitate the delivery of end-to-end health care solutions." Under the new structure, current and new Solucient clients will continue to have access to powerful tools such as CHAMP, Peer-A- Med(r), and AUTO-AUDIT(r). Clients will also benefit from information provided through the new Solucient Polaris( Suite and Solucient's length of stay (LOS) data files. Solucient provides comprehensive health care information to drive business growth, manage costs, and help deliver quality care for providers, payers, employers, and pharmaceutical companies. Among the NGS clients that will be using CHAMP is Parker Hannifin, a diversified manufacturer of motion and control technologies and systems based in Cleveland. Parker will use the program to continue to build on health care initiatives for its self-funded program, which includes monitoring the impact of its new consumer-driven plan option. Michigan-based Trinity Health - another NGS client - will implement CHAMP in early 2004 as it embarks on a three-year strategy to align its health plan with overall organizational principles for health awareness, health management responsibility, and health advocacy. Solucient's CHAMP aggregates employee claims data to help organizations analyze health care trends to identify factors driving up costs and to lower expenditures. Peer-A-Med helps health plans improve their overall performance by transforming large amounts of provider data into actionable information that can help lower costs and improve patient outcomes. AUTO-AUDIT's editing capabilities help give health plans the ability to detect and correct coding discrepancies prior to payment. Solucient's length of stay (LOS) data files help utilization management professionals in hospitals and health plans understand and compare how patients spend time in various inpatient hospital settings to aid in pre-admission authorizations, discharge planning, benefit plan evaluations, and determine reimbursement. Leading Solucient's payer unit business development team is a lineup of seasoned veterans in both the employer and health plan markets. -- Josephine "Jerry" Kaple, PhD heads up business development for the Western U.S. region. A pioneer in the health care informatics industry and former CEO of Corporate Cost Management, she has provided tools and solutions to both health plans and employers for over 20 years. -- Mark Manning leads operations for the Eastern U.S. region. A former senior program director at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts and vice president of sales for Codman Research, Manning has over 15 years of experience providing solutions for employers and health plans. -- Claude Lagalante leads the Central U.S. region. He brings over 12 years of experience in hospital administration, running UnitedHealthcare's network leasing practice before moving into payer decision support in 1998. For more information on Solucient's payer products and services, visit http://www.solucient.com. ------ Solucient is the leading source of health care business intelligence. The company provides comprehensive, results-oriented information to drive business growth, manage costs, and help deliver quality care. Solucient's expertise and proven solutions enable providers, payers, employers, and pharmaceutical companies to achieve results and realize value. For more information, visit http://www.solucient.com. |