The increasing burden of chronic disease in the United States and other industrialized nations continues to drive healthcare costs to new heights...

The population suffering from chronic health conditions is substantial and growing. This trend is increasingly affecting the quality of life and productivity of individuals with poor health and taking a toll on the economy due to the resultant increases...

To ameliorate the healthcare costs and disease burden that result from smoking, employers are increasingly seeking smoking cessation programs to reduce risk among the employee population. This study of QuitNet Comprehensive, a multi media smoking cessation program, found that...

Compliance with hemoglobin A1c (A1c) testing is suboptimal despite the clear national recommendations and guidelines established for care of patients with diabetes...

Poor lipid control is a risk factor for cardiovascular diseases and diabetes complications. Frequently, however, patients with these diseases do not achieve blood lipid levels recommended by current standards of care...

Advanced analytic and forecasting methodologies can enable organisations to more fully leverage the data resources available to them. In the healthcare industry, service providers can use data mining methods to enhance the decision-making process in optimising...

Diabetes disease management (DM) programs strive to promote healthy behaviors, including obtaining hemoglobin A1c (A1c) and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) tests as part of standards of care...

Disease management (DM) comprises a heterogeneous group of patient-support and educational services that can enhance clinical control and increase quality of life for people living with a variety of diseases...

In addition to race and ethnicity, specific geographic regions are associated with poorer outcomes of care. Individuals with diabetes experiencing health disparities typically have worse long-term outcomes, such as increased diabetes complications and mortality...

Diabetes mellitus places a significant burden on the U.S. healthcare system. Because of the potential to reduce diabetic complications and costs through intensive management, diabetes has become a primary target for disease management programs...

The successful management of diabetes with a goal of achieving near-normoglycemia requires patients to make multiple lifestyle changes as part of an intensive, complex, and coordinated therapeutic regimen aimed at reducing the risk of complications associated with the disease...

A prevalent, chronic condition among members of the mushrooming elderly population in the United States, heart failure (HF) is a logical focus for population-based disease management...

This report documents the clinical improvements and costs experienced by a purchaser after introduction of a diabetes disease management program...

Diabetes disease management programs(DDMPs) are proliferating, but their effectiveness in improving quality and mitigating healthcare spending has been difficult to measure...

Diabetes disease management programs (DDMP) are proliferating, but their overall impact in improving quality of care using Health Employer Data and Information Set (HEDIS) quality metrics has not been well studied...

The purpose of this report is to estimate diabetes prevalence and annual health care costs for people with diabetes in 1992, compare average annual costs for diabetics and nondiabetics...

Abstract  The Internet can deliver smoking cessation interventions to large numbers of smokers. Little is known about the feasibility, reach, or efficacy of Internet cessation interventions. Virtually no data exist on who enrolls in cessation programs or on differences between

Abstract Organizations across industry sectors have intensified their initiatives to increase operational efficiency through effective resource allocation, and the health care sector is no exception. The health care industry has been faced with a number of additional factors that

Jane (not her real name), a woman in her 50s with heart failure, coronary artery disease, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, joined Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota’s (Blue Cross) care support program in November 2004. Care support

Today, in its third and latest incarnation, disease management enjoys widespread use among the vast majority of U.S. payers. All but 5 of the 120 U.S. payers assessed by our recent benchmarking study have DM programs in place. More than 80 percent of the medical and DM program directors we interviewed told us that their plans offered disease management because senior executives viewed it as a competitive necessity. Payers and employers have adopted disease management even though no standard methodology yet exists for measuring whether DM programs produce cost savings and how much. If such a methodology did exist, DM penetration would certainly be even higher.

Because effective disease management has significant impact on the quality of care delivered and on overall costs, it is a logical arena for collaboration. For it to occur, however, a natural distrust that generally exists between payers and physicians must be overcome.

PopWorks, an innovative population health management system, promises to produce solutions that will not only strengthen patient-physician relationships, but also significantly impact overall health care expenditures.

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – March 17, 2004 – American Healthways (Nasdaq: AMHC) and its Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota partner are recipients of the 2004 AstraZeneca-National Managed Health Care Congress (NMHCC) Partnership Award for their BluePrint for Health® program, award sponsors announced Tuesday in New York. BluePrint for Health® is the first total population disease management program proven to bend a health plan’s overall health-care cost trend by improving the health of members with chronic diseases and conditions.

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota Unveils 1st Year Program Results.

Outcomes for Medicare beneficiaries participating in American Healthways' comprehensive disease management program, diabetes Healthways, show a 17.1 percent or $114 per diabetes member per month reduction in total direct health care costs for the first year of operation.

Reducing Health Care Costs for Plan Members with Congestive Heart Failure. People with chronic illnesses such as diabetes mellitus and congestive heart failure (CHF) consume more than 60% of the medical care dollars spent in the US. Patients with CHF alone will account for $19.4 billion in direct health care costs in 2001, and an additional $21.0 billion in indirect costs in the form of lost productivity and mortality.

Abstract A convergence of market, clinical, regulatory, and consumer forces is creating a strong demand for high quality and cost effective health care services. Meeting this pressing need is one of the greatest challenges managed care organizations (MCOs), employers, and

Maximizing participation: The problems with patient enrollment

Employees need information and support to manage their own health - you need new ways to lower health care costs. BluePrint for Health care support makes it happen.

Finally. What’s good for business is good for people. Health care costs are at the forefront of issues facing business today.

Despite compound annual growth rates of 30% to 40% for the disease management (DM) industry over the past decade, the question "Does disease management work?" has persisted.