2017

Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU’s You Can Control Asthma Now (UCAN) community asthma program helps children who live in the Richmond, Virginia, metropolitan area where both asthma and poverty rates are disproportionately high.  Established in 2015, UCAN has served more than 344 patients using a family-focused case-management approach. Families are typically enrolled following an uncontrolled asthma-related emergency room visit or hospitalization, but can also be referred by their primary care physician or self-refer.   UCAN patients are assigned a pulmonologist (lung doctor) who provides comprehensive asthma care, receive asthma education from a nurse, and are provided resources and support to address barriers to treatment following evaluation by a social worker.  They receive follow up communication via text and phone calls, and are referred as needed for a Healthy Homes assessment through the City of Richmond Health District. UCAN also collaborates with the Medical Legal Partnership Program to empower families to address environmental housing issues not properly addressed by landlords. UCAN has saved $691 per patient through decreased hospitalizations and emergency room visits – leading to an overall cost reduction of $163,958. 

Health Care Service Corporation (HCSC), the nation’s largest customer-owned health insurer, in partnership with the American Lung Association of the Upper Midwest (ALAUM), has implemented comprehensive, community-based asthma quality improvement programs in more than 120 health care clinics in Illinois, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas. The program have served an estimated 435,545 individuals across these states, including low-income, Latino, and Native American populations. The ongoing effort works directly with providers to improve the quality of care being delivered to patients with asthma, in addition to direct engagement with individuals through home environmental assessments that include asthma education and providing allergen-reducing and remediation products. The company leverages its own medical claims data to  identify providers serving the highest-risk children with asthma and the ALAUM invites these clinics to take part in a year-long learning collaborative and training program based on the National Asthma Education Prevention Program developed by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute. Overall, hospitalizations for children years 18 and younger have reduced by 59 percent and emergency department (ED) visits have been reduced by 54 percent. For individuals older than 18 years, results showed a 52 percent reduction in hospital stays and a 56 percent reduction in ED visits for this population. The program has also realized a positive return on investment – a savings of $2.40 per dollar spent. Not only are patients able to better manage their asthma, but significant reductions in avoidable medical utilization drives down the cost of care for all and allows the company to play a vital role in making the health care system work. 

Esperanza Community Housing Corporation (Esperanza) serves the communities located in South Los Angeles, an area that is home to almost one million residents and one of the most economically disenfranchised areas in the County of Los Angeles.  Founded in 1989 out of a successful community organizing campaign to prevent the displacement and housing vulnerability of tenants, Esperanza has grown to become a national leader in advancing the Promotores de Salud (Community Health Promoters)  Model  in targeting health disparities, improving health, and increasing access to health services for community residents.  Since 1995, Esperanza has trained and mobilized 474 Promotores de Salud, through an intensive 6-month training, to provide culturally accessible primary prevention, health education  and advocacy services to families and children in South Los Angeles.  In 1998, Esperanza began cultivating its Healthy Homes collaborative to address primary prevention of lead poisoning and other housing-based hazards,  in a multi-layered approach to mitigating environmental health hazards in the home.  Recognized as a National Healthy Homes Leader, Esperanza established the Healthy Breathing Program which uses a Healthy Homes approach in its home-visitation model to focus on the identification of asthma triggers, iterative health education, and management of asthma episodes in the home.  

Along with their team of Promotores, Esperanza’s Healthy Breathing Program partners with federally qualified health centers, local hospitals, and clinics to provide comprehensive services to asthma patients throughout the year.   Esperanza’s Healthy Breathing Program features repeated in-home visits and a year-long patient evaluation; identifies and helps control in-home asthma triggers; and, provides in-depth asthma education for patients, household members, and caregivers.  The program strives to enroll at least 500 pediatric and adult asthma patients every three years.  These efforts have led to improvements in prescription adherence, increases in the number of patients with asthma action plans, reduction in severe asthma episodes, and more efficient referrals to medical homes and wrap-around services.  The Healthy Breathing Program provides valuable cost savings by reducing the number of unnecessary emergency room visits.  A 2012 analysis of a single emergency department saw more than 1.4 million dollars in savings by utilizing preventative in-home and outreach education.