HIEs Save Payers Big Bucks

A study of emergency-department visits conducted by Humana in the Milwaukee area shows that payers can save money if EDs have access to community health information exchanges (HIEs). When ED clinicians queried patients' encounter histories in the Wisconsin Health Information Exchange (WHIE), the patients' visits cost Humana $29 less, on average, than did visits by patients whose doctors did not have the benefit of that information, the study found. Much of the savings came from a reduction in redundant testing.

The study, which ran from 2008 to 2010, involved 1,482 fully insured Humana members who sought care at 10 Milwaukee hospitals. The test group consisted of patients for whom the WHIE database was consulted during at least two ED visits; the database was not consulted for those in the control group, who also made at least two ED visits.