Personalized preventive care leads to significant reductions in hospital utilization

To assess the impact of the MDVIP model of personalized preventive care on hospital utilization rates over a 5-year period.

This study was a comparative hospital utilization analysis between MDVIP members and nonmembers using the Intellimed database from 5 mandatory reporting states (New York, Florida, Virginia, Arizona, and Nevada) from 2006 to 2010.

Hospital discharge rates per 1000 persons were calculated and comparisons were made between members and nonmembers by age (Medicare [>65 years] vs non-Medicare [35-64 years]) and year.

Overall, MDVIP members were approximately 42%, 47%, 54%, 58%, and 62% less likely to be hospitalized relative to nonmembers for the years 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, and 2010, respectively. By 2010, MDVIP hospital discharges for the Medicare population were 79% lower than the nonmember Medicare population, and this difference was shown to be trending up since 2006 (70% to 79%). A similar trend was seen in the non- Medicare population (49% to 72%). In addition, elective, non-elective, emergent, urgent, avoidable, and unavoidable admissions were all lower in the MDVIP members compared with nonmembers for each year.

The MDVIP model of personalized preventive care allows the physician to take a more proactive, rather than reactive, approach; we believe this increased physician interaction is the reason for the lower hospital utilization and ultimately lower healthcare costs seen here.