Oscar Health Patient Pings

NCT ID: NCT02923024

Last Updated: 2018-12-12

Basic Information

• Recruitment Status: WITHDRAWN
• Clinical Phase: NA
• Study Classification: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Start Date: 2017-12-31
• Study Completion Date: 2018-12-31

Brief Summary

Oscar spends a significant amount of money every year on high cost high need individuals. With this increase in health care spending, Oscar Health is looking to expand care post emergency room and inpatient utilization for their members. In order to reduce hospital readmissions, reduce emergency room utilization, and increase the overall health of their members, Oscar is investing in a program to bring members better care through increased engagement with their primary care physician.

Detailed Description

Using their existing technology, Oscar is employing a randomized controlled trial among their physicians to improve their engagement and relationships with patients. The goal will be to test and refine patient pings as a provider engagement tool, with an eye toward using it within the broader approach to high-risk patients as well. The Penn team is helping to design the intervention, which includes helping with determining what the three arms will be and randomizing physicians and practice sites. They will implement a three-arm trial with the first arm being usual care (no pings), the second arm being the intervention of information, and the third arm being the intervention of information and financial incentives. In the two intervention groups, providers will be sent patient pings after a patient experiences a trigger event. This trigger event could be an emergency room visit, admission to a hospital, or a hospital discharge event. The patient ping will be sent to the patients doctors including primary care physicians and specialists. If the patient does not have a doctor, a ping will not be sent. In the third arm, physicians will be incentivized to see patients immediately via phone call or in office visit. Physicians will receive an incentive for calling the member within 48 hours of trigger event and will receive a larger financial incentive for seeing the patient for an office visit within 7 days of trigger event. This bonus payment will be paid to physicians uncoupled from usual reimbursement as a separate bonus check to increase salience. No pings will be sent to the physicians for the patients randomized to arm 1: usual care.

Conditions

Emergency Room Utilization

Study Design

• Allocation Method: RANDOMIZED
• Intervention Model: PARALLEL
• Primary Study Purpose: HEALTH_SERVICES_RESEARCH
• Blinding Strategy: SINGLE

Study Groups

Usual Care

This arm will be usual care and there will be no intervention.

Group Type: NO_INTERVENTION

No interventions assigned to this group

Information

In this arm, providers will be sent patient pings after a patient experiences a trigger event. The ping will be a fax sent from Oscar to the physician alerting them of an event their patient had.This trigger event could be an emergency room visit, admission to a hospital, or a hospital discharge event. The patient ping will be sent to the patient's doctor including primary care physicians and specialists. If the patient does not have a doctor, a ping will not be sent.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Patient Ping

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

The patient ping will be a fax sent from Oscar Health to physician that will include information on the physician's patient's trigger event and contact information for the physician to reach out to the member.

Information and Financial Incentives

In this arm, providers will be sent patient pings after a patient experiences a trigger event. The ping will be a fax sent from Oscar to the physician alerting them of an event their patient had.This trigger event could be an emergency room visit, admission to a hospital, or a hospital discharge event. The patient ping will be sent to the patient's doctor including primary care physicians and specialists. If the patient does not have a doctor, a ping will not be sent. Physicians will be incentivized to see patients immediately via phone call or in office visit. Physicians receive a financial incentive for calling the member within 48 hours of trigger event and will receive a larger financial incentive for seeing the patient for an office visit within 7 days of trigger event.

Group Type: EXPERIMENTAL

Patient Ping

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

The patient ping will be a fax sent from Oscar Health to physician that will include information on the physician's patient's trigger event and contact information for the physician to reach out to the member.

Interventions

Patient Ping

The patient ping will be a fax sent from Oscar Health to physician that will include information on the physician's patient's trigger event and contact information for the physician to reach out to the member.

Intervention Type: BEHAVIORAL

Eligibility Criteria

Inclusion Criteria

• Primary care and specialist physicians under contract with Oscar Health insurance

Exclusion Criteria

• Any primary care and specialist physician not under contract with Oscar Health.

• Eligible Sex: ALL
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Sponsors

Oscar Health Insurance

UNKNOWN

Sponsor Role: collaborator

University of Pennsylvania

OTHER

Sponsor Role: lead

Responsible Party

Amol Navathe

Principal Investigator

Responsibility Role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR

Other Identifiers

825856

Identifier Type: -

Identifier Source: org_study_id