Transforming a payer-provider relationship from conflict to collaboration

The current relationship between payers and providers is often adversarial. The growth of managed care has fostered very little cooperation between the payer and provider, even though both are working toward improved patient outcomes. This article describes the process by which a payer and provider were able to transform a contentious relationship into a collaborative patient-centered program. The program demonstrates that through the sharing of retrospective utilization data, improved clinical and financial outcomes can be achieved.