Dignity Health, Optum join forces
Optum360 will modernize revenue cycle management, simplify billing
Dignity Health, one of the country’s largest healthcare systems, has formed a revenue cycle management company with Optum, part of UnitedHealth Group. The venture, Optum360, combines Dignity Health’s current revenue cycle management infrastructure and network scale with Optum’s technology, analytics and broad client base of providers and health plans.
Dignity Health initially announced the venture in a financial statement last month. According to the company’s statement, it entered into a formal agreement with OptumInsight in July. Dignity Health will have a non-controlling minority interest in the new company. The health system said it anticipates recording a gain from the transaction.
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Dignity Health also said it entered into an agreement to purchase revenue cycle management services from Optum360 for $250 million a year for 10 years. Dignity said in the financial filing that it “expects to achieve gains in revenue realization.”
The new company, Optum360, is designed to simplify billing and increase cost transparency for patients and transform administration and medical record documentation for providers and payers, including supporting new care delivery and risk-sharing models, such as accountable care organizations.
Optum360 will be the exclusive revenue cycle services provider to Dignity Health’s hospitals, clinics and physicians and is working to attract other provider partners, according to a news release issued Monday.
San Francisco-based Dignity Health owns and operates facilities in California, Arizona and Nevada. It also provides occupational health and urgent care services in 17 states through U.S. HealthWorks Inc., which Dignity Health acquired in 2012. About 3,000 employees from Dignity Health and Optum will make up workforce of Optum360.
The services and technology from Minneapolis-based Optum will also include integrated electronic financial records, ICD-10 resources, computer-assisted coding applications, utilization management capabilities, clinical documentation improvement and claims management tools.
“The health care billing process is too often a source of stress during a time when healing should be the primary focus …,” said Lloyd Dean, president and CEO of Dignity Health, in the release. “Our goal is to modernize the revenue cycle so that it is intuitive and easy to manage, and allows patients and providers to focus their attention on healing.”
The partnership aims to streamline approvals and claims adjudications to support the relationship between providers and payers and enable more information so that payers can understand their members’ treatment plans, including intervention outcomes and associated medical costs.
Dignity Health and UnitedHealthcare have partnered previously this year, along with Baylor Health Care System and Advocate Health Care, on a venture called Shared Clarity to study the long-term effectiveness of implanted medical devices, including stents, pacemakers and heart valves.
