Cardiology Success in Value-Based Care w/ Chamber CEO, George Aloth | HealthBiz Briefs

Value-based care often focuses on primary care rather than specialties.

But can and should that change?

Especially when it comes to cardiology.

In this HealthBiz Brief, George Aloth, CEO of Chamber, explains how they are enabling cardiology teams to excel in a value-based system by ensuring providers are rewarded for delivering the right care at the right time.

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🎙️⚕️ABOUT CARETALK
CareTalk is a weekly podcast that provides an incisive, no B.S. view of the US healthcare industry. Join co-hosts John Driscoll (President U.S. Healthcare and EVP, Walgreens Boots Alliance) and David Williams (President, Health Business Group) as they debate the latest in US healthcare news, business and policy.

🎙️⚕️ ABOUT GEORGE ALOTH
George is a seasoned healthcare operations and business executive with over 15 years of experience. He has held roles including Group President at Somatus, a leader in value-based kidney care, President & CEO of a BCBS health plan, and COO at a Medicaid/Medicare payer. Additionally, he serves on the Board of Directors at George Washington University Hospital.

🎙️⚕️ ABOUT CHAMBER
Chamber empowers cardiology practices to thrive in a value-based care environment by ensuring they are compensated for delivering the right care at the right time. Their technology facilitates comprehensive patient care and opens up new revenue streams.

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Transcript

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We hear a lot about value -based care, but most models focus on primary care rather than major high -cost specialties. Can value -based care play a role in cardiology? And what does that look like for practices and their patients? As kids, we're always learning and growing, but as adults, we can sometimes lose that sense of curiosity that makes life exciting. It's easy to fall into a routine. Therapy can help you break out of it. If you've been considering starting therapy, now is the perfect time to give it a try. BetterHelp offers entirely online therapy that's designed to be convenient, flexible, and tailored to fit your schedule. Whether you're dealing with stress, anxiety, or seeking personal growth, BetterHelp connects you with licensed therapists who can support you on your journey to rediscovering your curiosity and becoming your best self. Don't miss out on therapy. Visit betterhelp .com slash care talk to get 10 % off your first month and take the first step toward enhancing your mental wellbeing. That's betterhelp, H -E -L -P dot com slash care talk. Welcome to Health Biz Briefs. I'm David Williams, president of Health Business Group here with George Aloth. He is co -founder and CEO of Chamber Cardio. The company is tackling the high cost of heart disease with an integrated healing approach that leverages value -based care to future -proof cardiology. Welcome, George. Thanks, David. Appreciate you having me here. So I love that term, future -proofing cardiology. So what is the role of value -based care in future -proofing cardiology? Yeah, David. you know, cardiology as we have it today is broken. It's the largest expense in health care, $400 billion a year and growing and health outcomes are not getting better. And so really, that's why we chose here at Chamber to try to really attack this problem and bring value -based care solutions to cardiology. I think the key here is, you know, we've seen this work in other spaces. We've seen it in primary care. We've started to see it in nephrology and oncology. There's no reason why it can't work. cardiology. know, Humana recently put out a study that showed all the success they had in kidney BPC. I think we've taken a lot of the lessons that we've learned in these other spaces. If we apply it to cardiology, we really can make a difference in cardiology spend. do like those businesses where you can take a model from somewhere else and then apply it. And certainly it's challenging to do it. But at least there's a roadmap in a sense that you could you could follow. Do you think we're ever going to get healthcare costs, including cardiology costs under control. I've heard a variety of ways of saving money, having value -based care and so on. But at the same time, it seems like the costs continue to rise no matter what we do. Well, it's a $400 billion a year problem, right? So we have to get these costs under control. And that's really what our plan is. I think that when you think about value -based care, engagement and collaboration are really the keys to success. And so for us and for our model, We want to work through the doctors, work through the cardiologists. We don't want to take the power. Our goal is really to enable them and give them all the stuff that they don't have. And so as we start to think about data and as we start to think about technology, think about stratifying their population and providing support where the cardiologist doesn't have time to do it in a lower level, know, practitioner can help. That's where we come in. And so you think about, you know, drug costs and getting people on the right medications and the right titrations of medication, getting people services in the right side of service, keeping people in the hospital. There's so many unnecessary admissions that happen in our space. These are the types of things that we can really help with to bring down the cost in the cardiology space and for members with heart disease. You know, you've had a very interesting career so far and you were running a blues plan, which is, you know, quite a heady role. And especially since you were doing it during the pandemic. I mean, what was it like running a blues plan during the pandemic? Yeah, it was probably the most interesting and challenging part of my career. I was the COO at a startup that had been acquired by Care First, Blue Cross, Blue Shield. And so a couple of things were happening at once. I was taken over as a CEO for the first time managing this Medicaid plan. We had just won a new contract. We were tripling in size, which was all the challenges that came with that. And then within 30 days, boom, COVID hits. And nobody knew what was going on. You know, we think about it even in our role, it was extra critical because of the vulnerable populations that we were managing. know, nobody knew how to deal with this. There was inherent distrust in the medical system and the health system from lot of the Medicaid populations. People didn't understand what vaccines were. People that really had jobs, but they couldn't work from home like you and I. They had to actually get on the train and go to work. These were the kinds of challenges that we were dealing with. You know, one thing that I really took away from all of it was, you know, it was the first time you really felt that everybody was in it together, right? Whether it was the health insurance company, the patients, the doctors, you know, the community advocates, we all wanted the same thing. And that was to kind of figure this out together and get through it together. while that was the biggest challenge in my career, it was certainly a very rewarding process during that time. Well, that's it for the latest Health Biz Brief. If you like what you hear, check out my Health Biz Podcast for a full length interview with George about his life and career. George Aloth, CEO of Chamber Cardio. Thanks for joining me today on Health Biz Briefs. Thanks, David. Really appreciate the time.