Some consulting companies are offering a “helping hand” to health insurance companies to glean specific information from their patient data.  This approach is a way for insurers to “manage” patients, instead of avoiding them as they have in the past.  This method of using “big data” to identify high-risk patients may not be so advantageous for the patients.  The insurance companies assert that the use of this method is an effort to “pinpoint the high-risk patient and manage their care so they don’t wind up in the emergency room or in a hospital bed”, or to “keep them healthy”.  Is this a bit overreaching or could this be beneficial to the patients as well?  Make your own decision by reading this Medscape article.  Link to article

Published by:  Modern Healthcare:  Bob Herman –  August 20, 2016