701 Pennsylvania Ave. N.W.
Suite 700
Washington, DC 20004
(202) 737-5980
dmaa@dmaa.org
www.dmaa.org

Monday, Sept. 8, 8 - 8:30 a.m.

In this session, participants will learn about a preliminary offshore, Web-based disease management program designed to enable enrollees to manage their chronic health care conditions. Components include assessment of satisfaction, data trending, automated feedback and online access to professional advice. This program, completely housed in India, is intended for use by people with chronic conditions in the United States. The session will describe three advantages of low-cost overhead for Web-based disease management, recount three additional applications that may be added to Web-based disease management and elaborate on the possible fit with other traditional, population-based care approaches.

Jaan Sidorov, MD, FACP, CMCE, is an independent health care consultant for Sidorov Health Solutions Inc. He has more than 20 years experience in primary care and population-based care coordination initiatives, including the development of several innovative and widely regarded disease management programs.

Lynn Ventura is director of business development for Health Support Systems Inc. An entrepreneur with more than 17 years experience in business development, Ms. Ventura has worked in a wide variety of industries, including real estate development, financial services and, most recently, the health care services industry, focusing on residential care facilities for the elderly.

Expenditures for Japan's mandatory national health insurance system are growing due to the aging population. A national disease prevention program begins in April 2008, focused on reducing metabolic syndrome. All those between 40 and 74 years old, approximately 56 million people, will be screened annually. Management programs will be provided for those in need, estimated to be about 25 percent of those screened. The current market size for preventive medicine (mostly annual physicals) is about $2.5 billion in Japan. The potential market size of this new Japanese disease management program is estimated to be an additional $1.6 billion, most of which will be outsourced to the private sector. This presentation will describe specific examples of screening and management programs underway, give an update on the evolving government regulation of population management and comment on the most recent overall acceptance and progress to date for this ambitious new national disease prevention program.

Atsushi Kobayashi, MA, is CEO of Sompo Japan Research Institute, a large think tank with significant expertise in the international and comparative study of health care. He graduated with a degree in economics from Hitotsubashi University in Tokyo, and is the founder and director of The Japan Society of Health Support Science.

Gregg L. Mayer, PhD, is president of Gregg L. Mayer & Company Inc. He received his doctorate from University of California Berkeley and studied Japanese at Keio University, Tokyo. He is a founding board member of both the Disease Management Association of Japan and the Japan Society for Health Support Science.

Shinya Oku, MD, PhD, is an associate professor of health care informatics for the University of Tokyo Hospital. He also is an associate professor of radiology at Saitama Medical Center.

In a prospective longitudinal study in Germany, the disease risk of a group of patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus was intensively supervised and evaluated using the PROCAM score. The reduction in risk was based on improvements in clinical parameters: cholesterol, triglycerides, BMI, blood pressure and HbA1c. Relevant lifestyle changes were supported by recognized procedures for behavioral change. The 10-year myocardial infarction risk fell by a statistically significant 4.5 percent-from 31.9 percent to 27.4 percent. Hear how a German program learned how to improve, measure and translate clinical outcomes into economic benefit.

Thomas Hudler is a manager in the department of managed care with Versicherungskammer Bayern, a German insurance company. A sociologist, he is responsible for disease management programs and specializes in telemedicine and program evaluation.

Ruth Philipp is director of health care management at ArztPartner almeda AG, a full service provider of health care in Germany. An industrial psychologist, she has more than six years experience in development and implementation of disease management and integrated care programs.

In the United Kingdom, the National Health Service's policies align with the chronic care model and aim to bring care closer to home and out of secondary care, particularly for patients with long-term conditions. With care management interventions come opportunities and challenges, particularly around general practitioners as independent contractors, the pervasive use of electronic medical records and the potential for rich data capture and analysis. This session will cover unique attributes of the United Kingdom system with relevance to care management and opportunities for application in the United States, such as the role of nearly real time data collected from primary care through electronic medical records; the challenges with strict data confidentiality issues; the power of general practitioners as independent contractors within a largely integrated system; national and local quality improvement initiatives; the need to provide an efficient service without increasing health inequalities/inequity; and the alignment of population health management and social care.

Matthew Siegel, MBA, is the vice president of analytics for Health Dialog UK. He is responsible for the development of analytic tools for use by the National Health Service organizations in the design and implementation of interventions and care pathways to improve quality and reduce costs.

A German telemedicine program was developed for patients with congestive heart failure (CHF). As part of a prospective controlled study, the body weight of 251 patients with CHF was monitored and patients were coached in a disease management program. Another group of 251 patients served as control. After an average observation period of 12 months, the duration of hospital stay had been reduced by 48 percent and the total costs had fallen by 39.5 percent (6,993 euros per patient). The mortality rate was reduced by 46 percent. The study revealed effective ways to target telemedicine programs to patients who benefit most of the intervention, combine aspects of patient coaching with telemedicine monitoring and measure outcomes in terms of mortality and costs.

Michael P. Blasius is the director of sales and marketing for ArztPartner almeda AG in Munich. Previously, he was the head of the medical service center of ArztPartner almeda AG and responsible for the implementation and operations of disease management programs for more than 30 insurance companies.

Birgit Kielblock is project manager of chronic heart failure for Kaufmännische Krankenkasse Hannover, one of the biggest statutory health insurers in Germany. After studying information technology, she gained experience in clinical research at a German university hospital. For the past six years, she has been responsible for the development of disease management programs.