FAIR Health launched a new website feature that combines clinical and cost information to support seriously and chronically ill patients and their caregivers in the process of shared decision making (SDM) with clinicians for three palliative care scenarios.
The new feature is the most recent addition to fairhealthconsumer.org, FAIR Health’s consumer website, which enables consumers to estimate the typical costs of medical and dental procedures in their geographic areas and provides educational materials on the fundamentals of health insurance. A national, independent nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing transparency to healthcare costs and health insurance information, FAIR Health powers the cost information on FAIR Health Consumer with its database of billions of private healthcare claims–the largest in the nation. The same database provides the cost data for the new SDM feature, fairhealthconsumer.org/shared-decision-making.
SDM, the discussion between patients/caregivers and healthcare providers regarding various treatment options, has been known to increase patient engagement and reduce healthcare costs. But in the past, the utility of SDM tools, or decision aids, has been limited by the absence of cost data to complement the clinical information. As part of a pilot funded by The New York Community Trust (The Trust), the new SDM tool combines cost data from FAIR Health with Option Grid™ decision aids from EBSCO Information Services. The decision aids offer clinical and cost information related to:
- Kidney dialysis for patients with kidney failure (whether to continue or stop);
- Nutrition options when swallowing is difficult; and
- Breathing assistance (whether to continue or stop).
Read more:
- Shared Decision Making: https://www.fairhealthconsumer.org/shared-decision-making