Alliance Blog

Everside Health is one of the nation’s largest providers of direct primary and mental health care—Improving outcomes with tech-enabled predictive care, reducing costs, and providing holistic solutions, in person and virtually, for employees, patients, and their families. Learn more about Everside Health.

Astellas contributes toward improving the health of people around the world through the provision of innovative and reliable pharmaceutical products. They go beyond all others in exploring and tapping the potential of the life sciences. They continue tackling new challenges and creating innovative pharmaceutical products. They support healthy living for people around the world. Learn more ...

As a global leader in diabetes care, Abbott is constantly working to deliver the highest quality products and unwavering support to their customers. Consistent and accurate glucose monitoring is the foundation of any diabetes management plan so they’ve committed to continuous improvement in the way patients and professionals measure, track and analyze glucose levels. Learn ...

Homethrive’s two founders both experienced the challenges of caregiving for family members while working. They found a confusing, hard to navigate system. Even after taking countless days off work and spending long hours on the phone, they couldn’t find the answers they needed. They knew there had to be a better way, so they created ...

The Mission of Health Care Originals is to help people listen to their bodies in new ways, tapping the previously underutilized science of sound to map and understand human performance. Their goal is to improve the continuum of care for respiratory disease – from drug development through individual monitoring, empowering patients to live better with ...

Behavioral Health Systems, Inc. provides a personalized approach to behavioral health. BHS provides comprehensive behavioral health services to employers and their covered members, recognizing that when an employee is experiencing stress on the job, struggling with substance abuse or simply looking for advice balancing life’s difficult duties, they need somewhere to turn. Learn more about ...

For 22 years, Northwest Health Law Advocates (NoHLA) has been working to improve access to health care for all Washington residents to advance health as a human right. NoHLA is at the forefront of efforts to ensure Washington State’s new health system attracts enrollees and that it works for all residents, including those who are ...

Quilted Health is a dedicated team of Certified Nurse Midwives, Licensed Midwives and Client Care Professionals. They partner with the best birth doulas, obstetricians, wellness providers and community organizations to provide personalized, whole-person care. Learn more about Quilted Health.

I am delighted to report that the Washington Health Alliance is continuing its efforts to understand where Washington state is spending its health care dollars. Today we released our Total Cost of Care Report. Using medical claims and enrollment data from its voluntary All-Payer Claims Database from multiple payers, the Alliance combined the cost of ...

More than 100 million American adults have high blood pressure (a reading of 130/80mm Hg or higher) but only about half actually have the condition under control. High blood pressure was linked to 70% of all major cardiovascular events in the U.S. and deaths from high blood pressure are on the increase; between 2009 and ...

On June 10th, we received a letter from the Washington State Health Care Authority terminating contract negotiations with the Washington Health Alliance to serve as the Lead Organization for WA-APCD (LO). We began negotiations on October 24, 2019. I believe this is a very unfortunate outcome for our state. Throughout the negotiations, the Alliance was ...

Many healthcare organizations in Washington state are encountering workforce woes with worker shortage, burnout, turnover, etc. But how can leadership successfully address these challenges? Join the Greater Columbia Accountable Community of Health (GCACH) for a unique opportunity to learn from experts on ways to strengthen and optimize your organization’s workforce strategy at its Future of ...

Spine Care Partners help providers deliver simpler, easier & better spine care that improves quality while reducing costs. They engage providers in their value enhancing best practices care program and provide an app that helps members make good decisions about their spine health. Learn more about Spine Care Partners, LLC. The Vancouver Clinic has supported ...

There is no denying that we’ve had to face a succession of difficult situations and bad news–the challenges of navigating through a pandemic, escalating inflation, and the devastating impact of gun violence, to name a few.  It’s only natural to feel that we can’t exert much control over the course of external events but let’s ...

Award-winning director Jill Salvino travels the country opening hearts and minds with Between the Shades—a film that can be described as 50 conversations exploring the many different shades of being gay in America. As part of the Washington Health Alliance Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion Initiative event on June 25th at the Egyptian Theater in Seattle, ...

Washington Health Alliance Director of Purchaser Strategies Denise Giambalvo and Director of Data Management and Analyst Mark Pregler co-presented “Driving Market Change through Multi-Stakeholder Collaboration” at the Civitas Networks for Health Member Roundtable Meeting on May 23rd. They reported on the analysis conducted by the Alliance in the first phase of this work, Aligning to ...

More than 250,000 people die in the United States each year because of medical mistakes, making it the third highest cause of death in the country. Researchers found that most medical errors are caused by systemic problems, including poorly coordinated care, fragmented insurance networks, the absence or underuse of safety nets and other protocols, and ...

The National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions is holding its 6th Annual Leadership Summits on June 27 and 28 in Detroit, Michigan, with virtual and in-person options. This is an opportunity to network and learn from key healthcare and benefits stakeholders and change agents. Attendees typically include employers (senior leaders in benefits, HR, finance, healthcare strategy, ...

There is no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic has had serious repercussions on the nation’s mental health. A Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) survey shows that 25.9 million past-year users of alcohol and 10.9 million past-year users of drugs other than alcohol reported that they were using these substances “a little more ...

Sixteen Washington Health Alliance purchaser/employer members participated in a survey of wellness programs and vaccination rates. Survey participants ranged in size from fewer than 100 to more than 25,000 employees/members. The survey was conducted at the request of Washington House Representative My-Linh Thai, who has special interest in how purchasers incentivize vaccines through wellness programs. ...

Are we talking to one another yet? That was the key question asked in the Washington Health Alliance and Bree Collaborative’s second Framework for Action Webinar in 2022 titled, Interoperability: Continuing to Remove Barriers to Value-Based Success. Based on the presentations and panel discussion, it’s not clear we have the answer or if that’s the ...

Washington Health Alliance Medical Director Dr. Sharon Eloranta presented “Improving Value in Healthcare” to the University of Washington’s Executive Master of Health Administration class on April 23rd. The presentation included an introduction to the Alliance: its structure, mission, vision, main functions and reports, and how the Alliance’s products and programs support value in healthcare.  Dr. ...

The Washington Health Alliance is participating in the leadership of Civitas Networks for Health. Alliance Executive Director Nancy Giunto is joining the 2022 Nominating Committee to select the new Civitas Board of Directors which will replace the current transition board starting on January 1, 2023.  The transition board was put into place when Civitas was ...

A free webinar on using data to address racial bias will be held on May 5th at 1 pm PT with speaker Common Ground Health President and CEO Wade Norwood, who will be presenting findings from its recent Color of Health Report: The Devastating Toll of Racism on Black Lives. The report documents how racism, ...

The enduring strength of the Washington Health Alliance is in large part attributed to senior health care and business leaders in Washington who accept leadership roles on the Board of Directors because they care about collaborating around ways to drive quality and cost transparency and to improve health care affordability for all in our state. ...

More than 1,250 people attended the University of Michigan’s Center for Value-Based Insurance Design 2022 Summit last month, where stakeholders from across the country discussed the opportunities and challenges to reducing health care disparities. During the keynote panel, “Strategies to Reduce Health Care Disparities and Enhance Equity,” Dora Hughes, Chief Medical Officer at the CMS ...

by Alliance Medical Director Dr. Sharon Eloranta Do you enjoy “springing forward” when we make the change from Standard Time (ST) to Daylight Savings Time (DST) each year? For many, this change is more than a minor annoyance. So many people dislike it so much that Washington state passed a law signed by Governor Jay ...

by Alliance Medical Director Dr. Sharon Eloranta Unsafe care for patients is startlingly common – estimates indicate that at least 250,000 Americans die each year from incidents related to preventable medical error, and many more are harmed. To help address this issue, many organizations and businesses have come together to advocate for the creation of ...

March 21, 2022 Representative Suzan DelBene 2330 Rayburn House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 Via Email Dear Representative DelBene: Thank you for your leadership and your support to increase the adoption of value-based care and alternative payment models across the country. This subject is of great importance to the Washington Health Alliance (Alliance), a multi-stakeholder ...

The Theme for Black History Month is Black Health and Wellness. Unfortunately, there is much to remind us of how far we have to go on both fronts. There is no denying that the impact of discrimination in our health system is significant, as reflected by the disparities in care identified in “Unequal Treatment: Confronting ...

On February 11th, Washington Governor Jay Inslee appointed Washington Medical Director Dr. Sharon Eloranta to serve on the Robert Bree Collaborative, created in 2011 by the Washington State Legislature to enable public and private health care stakeholder to work together to identify specific ways to improve health care quality, outcomes, and affordability in Washington state. ...

The Washington Health Alliance’s new Total Cost of Care report has garnered significant attention, including coverage by the Everett Herald, AboutHealthTransparency.org, Healthcare Innovation, State of Reform, and hundreds of other news organizations across the country that carried the announcement. It has been called, ”exciting,” “courageous,” “amazing,” and “transformative.” The online tool provides unprecedented detail on ...

It is estimated that 80% of Americans will have some form of back pain in their lifetime, but not all of them will receive high quality health care to address it. As early as 1985, studies showed the benefits of motion in the healing process and speculation that “help will come in the next decade ...

The 17th Annual Summit by the University of Michigan Center for Value-Based Insurance Design (V-BID) will be held on March 23rd. A broad range of healthcare stakeholders from across the nation will address the topic, “Enhancing Health Equity,” including: reducing health care disparities; expanding the role of value-based insurance design by public and private payers; ...