Ross Owen Director 612-543-1324
Julie Bluhm Clinical Program Manager 612-348-8400
Jim Redmond Social service navigator 612-730-4345
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Hennepin Health is an innovative health care delivery program that was launched in January 2012.
The program is a collaboration between Hennepin County Medical Center (HCMC), NorthPoint Health and Wellness Center (NorthPoint), Metropolitan Health Plan (MHP), and Human Services and Public Health Department (HSPHD) of Hennepin County.
Hennepin Health members receive care from a multidisciplinary care coordination team. Other innovative features include a common electronic health record, and tiered care that is based upon a member’s identified needs.
Find eligibility and enrollment information at the MNsure website.
Visit us at www.hennepin.us/hennepinhealth
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It’s time to break out balloons and party hats because
Hennepin Health has expanded their healthcare to include families. While Hennepin Health has provided quality
care to adults for four years, we are now excited and honored to incorporate
services for children as well.
Since the beginning of 2016 Hennepin Health started working
with a small group of families. These
families will receive the same integrated services that have made Hennepin
Health an innovator in the healthcare field.
When providing care, these services consider a patient’s physical
health, mental health, and social needs. This integrated care ensures the patient receives the best possible outcome
while still managing costs.
On March 16th Hennepin Health will have an
information session for Hennepin County employees to learn about our work, and
to continue to identify collaborative opportunities.
Hennepin Health will meet the opportunity to serve mothers,
daughters, fathers, and sons with determination and pride. While we won’t leave members with a balloon
or a piece of cake, we will leave
them with peace of mind knowing that they are receiving the best possible care.
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On medical TV shows such as ER or Grey’s Anatomy, complex
health problems are resolved through dramatic meetings between the doctors and
nurses. The medical staff will flip through charts of a dying patient while
asking each other questions and re-examining pertinent information. Within their
spirited conversations some revelation about the illness or patient comes to
light that provides a just-in-time solution, and everyone walks away happily
ever after.
These meetings between hospital staff can be presented as
quite fanciful. Despite that, they underscore a critical idea about the
importance of sharing information. In healthcare, when professionals
communicate with each other, they provide higher-quality services to patients. That
connection is the basis for Hennepin County’s Population Health Grand Rounds.
Population health is an approach to patient care that
focuses on the health outcomes of a group of people. Hennepin Health has helped
pioneer this approach, and Hennepin County is moving towards it as a lens for
treating its entire population.
Population Health Grand Rounds are hour-long meetings where employees
across Hennepin County and Hennepin County Medical Center (HCMC) share
information about a specific topic and develop relationships. Employees who
attend include administrators, doctors, data professionals, social workers, and
housing navigators.
“We are not a bunch of separate departments,” said Ross
Owen, a co-sponsor of Population Health Grand Rounds. “We are part of a
forward-thinking and innovative network of care that includes healthcare
providers and other professionals.”
Unlike typical hospital rounds, these meetings don’t focus
on individual patients. Instead, they focus on macro issues such as
interpreting data, learning about different models of care, and health care
reform. They will occur five times in 2016 at various county locations.
Dana Soderlund presented the first topic, titled “HCMC
Patients with Homeless Indicators at Discharge.” Ms. Soderlund described
standard methods used to identify homelessness, and shared analysis regarding
characteristics, utilization, and readmission rates for such patients.
“Homelessness has risen as an important determinant of care,”
she stated. “Emergency Department utilization among the homeless is much higher
than with the general population.”
Looking at homelessness and other topics as a collective
group allows Hennepin County health professionals to develop a shared
understanding of a particular problem. With that shared understanding they can
brainstorm ideas and discuss solutions across departments. In a way, group
members are flipping through charts to save not just one patient, but many.
While future topics have yet to be finalized, their focus
will be on how to reform the healthcare system from one that treats sickness to
one that creates health. Topics might include outcomes for healthcare
utilization and cost, or examining housing and corrections information.
Regardless of the topic, Population Health Grand Rounds will
engage Hennepin County healthcare professionals in a unified discussion. These
discussions won’t provide immediate revelations that save a patient like an
ending to Grey’s Anatomy. They will, however, provide gradual improvement to
the entire healthcare system which will impact many, many people. That is an
outcome more dramatic than even the best medical TV show.
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The Hennepin County Mental Health Center and Bob Dylan may seem
an odd combination, but both have a similarly expressed belief: that the times
they are a-changing. For Bob that phrase
echoed through the 1960s as a call for social change. For the Hennepin County Mental Health Center the
phrase is more focused in scope, but equally important, as it reflects their
continued innovative changes to mental health care.
Hennepin County Mental Health Center’s most recent
innovation is adding a primary care physician to their mental health clinic. The center, which serves over 4000 people,
recognized that many of their patients showed difficulty in navigating the
health care system.
To assist these patients Hennepin Health provided funding
for a primary care physician, an RN care coordinator, and renovated space. By integrating primary care with mental
health care, both Hennepin Health and the Hennepin County Mental Health Center planned
to help patients reduce emergency department visits for basic medical needs,
reduce inpatient hospitalizations, and improve their physical health.
In June, the center brought in a primary care physician two
days a week to address these needs. Now
patients are able to access a primary care physician, psychiatrists, a nursing
staff, care coordinators, and a pharmacist all in one setting. According to Amber Morgan, an RN care
coordinator, the Hennepin County Mental Health Center provides the best care
possible. “People love having services
in one spot,” she said. “They find it
comfortable.”
Patients find it so comfortable that the center is expanding
their services. The center plans to have
a primary care physician on-site for 40 hours per week. They are bringing in another physician and building
two larger offices to accommodate this service. The old office will be turned into a lab room.
Improving the level of patient care is nothing new for the
Hennepin County Mental Health Center. In
2014 they recognized that patient volume exceeded resources. To solve this problem they implemented a
drop-in program that helped patients maintain psychiatric services while
allowing the center to use their resources more judiciously. As a result they received a Model Practice
award from the National Association of County and City Health Officials.
While many providers cap the number of people they serve,
The Hennepin County Mental Health Center does not. The center is a safety-net program that sees
mental health patients who are not eligible for services elsewhere. They meet the many needs of these patients,
and do so with great flexibility.
Hennepin County Mental Health Center’s innovative approach
to services better serves people with mental health needs. When Bob Dylan sang about the importance of
changing times, it’s easy to imagine that this is part of what he meant.
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