Alliance Blog

In one year, an estimated $282 million was spent on “wasteful” health care for 622,000 Washington patients Washington becomes just the third state in the nation to use a new tool called the MedInsight Health Waste Calculator to measure health care waste and put a price tag on overuse SEATTLE, Feb. 1, 2018 – In ...

Health care waste – the overuse of low-value services – introduces the unnecessary risk of adverse physical and financial harm for patients, drives up costs for purchasers and insurers, and strains the system. This is a serious problem in health care. However, by quantifying low-value care in the system, we can establish a baseline, raise ...

A new report from the United Health Foundation has ranked Washington No. 9 on a list of healthiest states in the nation. The report, America’s Health Rankings, evaluated 35 core measures in five model categories: Behaviors, community and environmental conditions, policies, clinical care, and outcomes data. Washington was ranked No. 7 last year, but fell ...

Last week was an exciting one for the Alliance, as we released the eleventh version of the Community Checkup report. The report includes the third results for the Washington State Common Measure Set for Health Care Quality and Cost, a set of 56 measures used to track progress in our state and a key component ...

We’re excited to announce that the 2017 Community Checkup report is now available! The report was released at our All-Alliance meeting yesterday and the results are now live at www.wacommunitycheckup.org. The 2017 Community Checkup report compares clinics, medical groups, hospitals, counties and Accountable Communities of Health on common types of quality care, such as preventive screenings and care ...

Third version of Washington State Common Measure Set shows quality of care varies dramatically across state SEATTLE, December 7, 2017. Washington State has a long way to go if it is to achieve excellence in the delivery of health care. That’s the key finding of the third results for the Washington State Common Measure Set ...

Improves care guidance for Castlight’s Washington state customers including Boeing, Esterline Technologies, Microsoft and Providence St. Joseph Health San Francisco and Seattle – November 8, 2017 – Today, Castlight Health, Inc. (NYSE: CSLT) announced a new partnership with the Washington Health Alliance, the state’s leader in healthcare cost and quality transparency. The partnership integrates Castlight’s ...

We’re excited to welcome the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation as the newest member of the Alliance. About the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Guided by the belief that every life has equal value, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation works to help all people lead healthy, productive lives. In developing countries, it focuses on ...

Last month I shared that the Alliance received a scholarship through the Network for Regional Healthcare Improvement’s Getting to Affordability initiative, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, for registration and travel to the National Affordability Summit in Washington, D.C. on September 27th. We have just returned from the summit and I am eager to ...

Wednesday, September 20, 2017 Networking: 9:30 am to 10:00 am Program: 10:00 am to 11:30 am Cambia Grove, 1800 9th Ave, Seattle, suite 250 The meeting is open to Alliance members only. Register here. Please join the Washington Health Alliance for a discussion about its recently released Hospital Value Report. Value in health care means ...

When we heard that Jocelyn Vanderbrink, MHA, a faculty member at Penn State, uses the Community Checkup website as part of a course she teaches on consumer choices in health care, we were excited to learn more. She shared with us her thoughts on the challenges facing today’s health care consumer and how she incorporates ...

A new study from the American Cancer Society published in JAMA shows that rates of colorectal cancer (CRC) are rising among younger adults, ages 20-54. Current recommendations do not advise CRC screening until age 50 (unless other risk factors or symptoms are present), so many cases in younger adults are not being identified until the ...