Assignment

Marketing and consumerism are important parts of the health care strategic planning process. Organizations must strategically market themselves to connect with potential consumers and increase their market share. Today's health care consumers want access to quality, patient-centered care; to remain competitive, organizations have to position themselves to be leaders in providing this care. To this end, the MD Anderson Cancer Center, for example, launched the "Making Cancer History" campaign, which effectively positioned them in their local market as a leading cancer treatment center.

This week, as you explore Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), you examine how they market their services and initiatives to increase health care consumerism.

Learning Objectives

Students will:
- Analyze evidence-based services/initiatives of ACOs
- Analyze how organizations market their services/initiatives to increase health care consumerism

Assignment Topic: Accountable Care Organizations

Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) play a key role in coordinating health care services for Medicare beneficiaries. These organizations have largely become consumer driven, making marketing and health care consumerism central to their success. By offering and marketing evidence-based, patient-centered services and initiatives, ACOs can better connect with consumers. For this Assignment, you examine the services and initiatives for an ACO in your state.

To prepare:
- Select an ACO from the website ACOs in Your State in this week's Learning Resources.
- Identify evidence-based services/initiatives that the ACO is using.

Note: To determine if services/initiatives are evidence-based

- Consider the following:
o Is the ACO using services/initiatives that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recognize and for which they offer reimbursements?
o How does the ACO market these services/initiatives to increase health care consumerism?

The Assignment

In a matrix, analyze evidence-based services/initiatives that the ACO you selected is using for each of the following:
- Quality of care
- IT
- Marketing
- Financial outcomes
- Population health programs
- Vertical versus horizontal integration
- Operational excellence

Include whether the ACO is using approaches that CMS recognizes for reimbursements and how these initiatives/services increase health care consumerism.

Synthesize the information you have gathered from your analysis so that each bullet point clearly represents the most significant considerations within each category. While this is a 1-page document that might appear to be simple, each point must be the result of deep and critical thinking.