Improving Health and Wellness in a Chronically Ill Medicaid Population: Implementing a Medication Reconciliation Program

Rhode Island, like many states, is actively working to implement the many elements of health reform. As part of this process, health administrators in Rhode Island and across the nation are being empowered to implement meaningful change that will make a dramatic difference in the quality of outcomes and efficiency of costs. As Greenwood (2009) observed “as plans are handed over for implementation, grass roots administrators have the power to make or break health care reform”. Evidence based healthcare initiatives are expanding across the nation and demonstration projects showing potential are being explored with the support of federal and state agencies. Our presentation will examine the successful partnership between Federal and state agencies and Rhode Island's healthcare community. The highlighted initiative will be the Medication Reconciliation strategies applied to a Medicaid population. Medication Reconciliation improves health care outcomes by connecting high level strategies to the frontline health care provider and the patient. Follow-up care, medication reconciliation, condition specific education and personal health recordkeeping are the core pillars of the program. The program will be presented in case study format that also demonstrates the successful utilization of the Plan, Do, Study, Act (PDSA) model endorsed by the Institute for Healthcare Improvement.