Healthy Outcomes to Help BCBSNC Customers Get Healthy, Manage Chronic Conditions, and Focus on Preventive Health, Wellness

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. – Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina’s (BCBSNC) customers now have even better options for getting and staying healthy thanks to Healthy Outcomes, a new wellness program that includes personalized health and disease management tools to help customers maintain healthy lifestyles and manage chronic conditions. Healthy Outcomes includes wellness, case management and maternity programs, as well as support for chronic conditions such as asthma and diabetes.

 

“Last year, we began working with SAS to develop deeper insights into the types of products and services healthcare consumers need. Now, our new Healthy Outcomes programs will enable us to provide the support consumers need to live healthier lives. Both of these efforts support our goal to help customers get and stay healthy. We know that when customers are healthier, health care can be more affordable, and everybody wins,” said Dr. Don Bradley, BCBSNC senior vice president and chief medical officer.

 

The four components of Healthy Outcomes – Healthy Outcomes Wellness, Healthy Outcomes Condition Care, Healthy Outcomes Case Management and Healthy Outcomes Maternity - encourage customers to get healthy, manage chronic health conditions, and focus on preventive health and wellness activities. The program includes personalized web content that is created  by gathering  information from health self-assessments, claims and pharmacy data to customize a webpage with activities that will be most useful for a customer. The content and activities will focus on areas an individual might need to improve such as healthy eating, resources to quit smoking or healthy aging tips. Individuals can further customize the webpage by prioritizing, removing and ignoring content, creating a personally-relevant and engaging experience.

 

To offer these wellness solutions, BCBSNC has collaborated with Alere Health, a leader in connected health information technology solutions.  Alere Health has demonstrated success in helping patients manage conditions – such as heart failure, coronary artery disease (CAD), diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and asthma – that can require a great deal of medical attention. Alere Health offers a complete range of tools and services that combine real-time data collection, education and personalized health management.

 

Healthy Outcomes Wellness
The Healthy Outcomes Wellness program, available to groups and individuals, gives employers all the tools they need to easily manage an effective wellness program for employees. This offering will help guide employees and their families toward better health and lower health care costs.

 

A few of the new Healthy Outcomes Wellness program features include:

 

 

The Healthy Outcomes Condition Care program is BCBSNC’s new disease management (DM) program for coronary artery disease (CAD), heart failure, asthma, diabetes and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Condition Care helps customers with these chronic conditions live as they’d like to live by offering information, tools, special benefits, and nursing support in partnership with the individual and his or her health care provider to provide individualized care.  

 

The Healthy Outcomes Case Management program reaches out to customers who may benefit from additional one-on-one   support for complex medical conditions. Members with a diagnosis such as cancer, a catastrophic accident, or stroke as well as patients seeing many different doctors or on many different medications can benefit from working with a nurse case manager who will assist them in creating health goals. The BCBSNC Case Manager provides support and education to help members successfully reach their personalized health goals. BCBSNC then helps these individuals better manage their health, improve the coordination of care, reach their health goals faster and avoid medical complications and unnecessary expense. This program is available to groups and individuals identified as having moderate health issues, chronic conditions or customers identified as being high-risk for these conditions.

 

The Healthy Outcomes Maternity program is a program for expectant and new mothers. The program offers support and guidance through pregnancy and the first year, reduces the potential for complications and provides a resource for questions regarding pregnancy. This program is available to employer groups with 100 or more employees and for women with high-risk pregnancies in the individual and smaller group markets.

 

Healthy Outcomes is not available for customers covered under the Federal Employee Program (FEP), State Health Plan (PPO and CMM), Medicare Advantage, or Medicare Supplement. 

 

 

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina is a leader in delivering innovative health care products, services and information to more than 3.6 million members, including approximately 900,000 served on behalf of other Blue Plans. For 78 years, the company has served its customers by offering health insurance at a competitive price and has served the people of North Carolina through support of community organizations, programs and events that promote good health. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina was named one of the World’s Most Ethical Companies by Ethisphere Institute in 2012. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina is an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. Visit BCBSNC online at bcbsnc.com.

About Alere Health:
Alere Health is the health management services business of Alere Inc. Alere, a Latin verb, meaning “to care for” or “to support,” offers the most patient-centered health management services available from a single provider in the industry. Alere provides health interventions that cover an individual’s entire lifespan, from pre-cradle to end-of-life care, and the company’s services range from wellness and prevention to the total health management of individuals with chronic illnesses. Alere’s continuum of services begins with preconception, pregnancy, NICU and first year of life; it continues with lifelong programs focused on health, wellness, the management of such conditions as heart failure, COPD, and asthma, and the complex management required for end-of-life care. For more information, visit alere.com/us/en/health-solutions/health-management.html.