Will Daines, MD, meeting with the first Connect Care patient on March 29, 2016.
“Connect Care has completely changed the way consumers can access healthcare,” says Jim Sheets, vice president and chief operating officer of Specialty-based Care. “We’ve created a convenient, low cost method for our community to receive quality care in the safety of their own home—a total gamechanger. Over the past five years, we’ve improved our efficiency, quality, and coordination, and it has spawned other innovations like e-visits, as well as access to specialists and a virtual primary care program. The best part of Connect Care is the dedicated caregivers. They’re complete rock stars and are the future of healthcare in this country.”
Rob Allen, senior vice president and chief operating officer, says, “Meeting people when, where and how they want to be served is where consumer-focused healthcare is going. Connect Care has helped us lead out on this front. Our Connect Care caregivers have been innovative, caring, responsive and consistent in delivering the care that’s needed. I’m so proud of their ongoing work and how well it serves those in need.”
Here are some Connect Care highlights:
- The first Connect Care visits on February 8, 2016 were with contracted American Well providers. Intermountain soon took over with two in-house advanced practice providers. Will Daines, MD, performed the first Intermountain provider led Connect Care patient visit on March 29, 2016.
- Intermountain caregivers were among the first to try out the new platform and offered valuable feedback, which helped the service and technology to improve.
- Connect Care is staffed with providers from many clinical backgrounds, including urgent care, family medicine, and emergency medicine. The providers have a combined 239 years of experience. The team now includes 17 providers who see patients 24/7, 365 days a year including holidays.
- The first year, Connect Care saw 4,554 patients. In 2020, 58,000 visits were completed with patients from all 50 states, making it the busiest urgent care in the Intermountain system.
- Video visits were a novelty when Connect Care was launched but have been very well received.
- Local insurance providers, including SelectHealth, came in early to extend Connect Care services to their members with real-time eligibility verification. SelectHealth has now found such value with the product that it offers Connect Care visits with a $0 co-pay for members.
- Connect Care patients consistently give extremely high reviews, rivaled only by the provider satisfaction scores of those working for Connect Care. Connect Care has only lost one provider since launch—which was a retirement.
- Intermountain was the first health system to publish a large-scale claims study showing virtual visits can be a safe and effective model for care while providing significant savings for integrated health systems.
- Connect Care has realized its vision in being part of the healthcare cost solution. Its lower cost has generated $33 million in value for the system and saved patients an estimated $20 million in reduced travel, saved time, and lower visit costs.
- Other service lines within Intermountain started using the Connect Care platform in 2017 to offer their own patients video visits, creating a much-needed foundation for keeping patients healthy in 2020.
- Connect Care launched a Behavioral Health service line in October 2020. It offers video based, same-day psychiatric appointments seven days a week, 12 hours a day. This new service focuses on mild-to-moderate diagnosis of depression, anxiety, ADHD, bipolar, and other mental illnesses. Additional services will be added to the Connect Care clinic soon.
- Connect Care continues to focus on leveraging technology to bring low cost and needed services to patients.
Thoughts from Connect Care providers:
Iva Martin, nurse practitioner: “When I worked in the ER, we always said the diagnosis comes 90 percent from the history and 10 percent from the physical. At Connect Care, we provide a great service by taking a good history and determining how best to care for our patients—whether it stops with treatment from us or recommending they go in for evaluation and treatment.”
Adam Wright, PA-C: “I value working with such a strong group of providers, caregivers, and leaders. I hope my patients feel heard, validated, and understood. I hope they receive great medical care and return when they need us again.”
Wayne Crawford, PA-C: “The entire Connect Care team is so positive, professional, and friendly in a way that makes it impossible not to love the job, the personal support, management style, corporate support, and community acceptance. The convenience just can’t be beat. I love it when a patient is pleasantly surprised at the personalized care they receive. This is the most successful medical pilot project I’ve ever been involved with.”
Cody Tapp, PA-C: “The coolest part of my job is being able to help patients from their own homes. I hope patients feel like they’ve been given sound medical advice that they would receive from seeing their doctor in person.”
Robin Dale, PA-C: “The best part of my job is connecting with kind patients who appreciate me and how hard I work to help them. Patients should use Connect Care because it’s quality care and a bargain, and we have smart providers.”