Alliance Blog

As a consumer, when you hear the word “value,” what does it mean to you? Do you think of what you can get at the local dollar store? Does it mean the best quality for the best price? But as an employer choosing a health plan for your employees, are you also thinking about value? ...

Letter from our executive director Sometimes relatively simple innovations can inspire big changes. For example, Swedish Medical Center, featured in our latest Spotlight on Improvement, is revamping its “daily labs” process—saving money, reducing discomfort and improving safety for their patients. This effort benefits consumers and providers and shows how delivery systems are committed to transforming ...

Read how Swedish Medical Center is making a big impact through a simple, innovative solution—changing the practice of ordering “daily labs,” or a lab automatically ordered for every day a patient is in the hospital. Following Choosing Wisely recommendations, Swedish Medical Center encourages physicians to only order tests that are clinically relevant. The results? This ...

This month, we’re excited to welcome Columbia United Providers, Inc. (CUP), Type2Companion.com and Recon Strategy as our newest members. Thanks to the support of our members, the Alliance is able to produce the Community Checkup and move the needle toward a more transparent and high-quality health system. Columbia United Providers, Inc. (CUP) Columbia United Providers, Inc. (CUP) ...

In June 2014, Washington State Governor Jay Inslee appointed a diverse group of leaders to serve on the Performance Measures Coordinating Committee (PMCC) to recommend standard statewide measures of health performance to inform public and private health care purchasing, as well as propose targets to track costs and improvements in health outcomes. The committee, along ...

Sometimes you can’t avoid going to the hospital, but you can try to be prepared before you go. Understand which hospitals are in your insurance plan’s network, know the details of your plan’s cost-sharing arrangement and if uninsured, begin to investigate the financial aid options at your local hospital. Why is it important, before going ...

The Washington Health Alliance has cultivated a reputation for its nonpartisan reporting on health care quality and cost in Washington state. For the last decade, our reports have been used by health care purchasers, such as King County government, to save millions of dollars on health care spending. Providers have used our data to see ...

This month, we’re excited to welcome two new members: International Community Health Services and Woodcreek Healthcare. Thanks to the support of our members, the Alliance is able to produce the Community Checkup and move the needle toward a more transparent and high-quality health system. International Community Health Services International Community Health Services (ICHS) is a ...

We are pleased to publish the detailed, county-level data we used to produce the 2014 Disparities in Care Report. Organizations such as public health departments, city and county governments, regional health improvement groups and hospitals have all expressed interested in gaining access to this data. Why? This data can inform health equity initiatives, population health ...

This month, we’re excited to welcome two new members: xG Health Solutions™ and Northwest Administrators, Inc. Thanks to the support of our members, the Alliance is able to produce the Community Checkup and move the needle toward a more transparent and high-quality health system. xG Health Solutions™ xG Health Solutions’ mission is to help health ...

In 2014, the Washington State Legislature passed ESHB 2572, which is a law relating to improving the effectiveness of health care purchasing and transforming the health care delivery system. A portion of this legislation (Section 6) relates to the development of a statewide core measure set. In response, the Washington Health Care Authority (HCA) with ...

The Alliance, on behalf of its members, has for the last several years worked with the National Business Coalition on Health (NBCH) to conduct a rigorous evaluation of health plans in Washington state using the eValue8 tool. We are pleased to share the results of the 2014 evalue8 process in our latest report, 2014 Report ...