DispatchHealth commissioned Milliman to conduct a study analyzing Regence BlueShield’s commercial and Medicare Advantage medical claim costs of its members using Dispatch’s services. Dispatch offers an emergency room alternative care model: an in-home, mobile care intended to serve as an alternative to hospital and emergency room visits for certain acute and urgent conditions. Regence contracts with Dispatch to make these services available to eligible members.
The report compares cohorts of Regence members using and not using Dispatch's services, and evaluates claim costs for 2022, 2023, and 2024. It describes the results of the study for Regence’s costs on a 100% of Medicare allowed basis for members with access to Dispatch’s services compared with a matched market benchmark. For this analysis, we created a matched population consisting of commercially insured, self-insured, and Medicare Advantage-insured individuals in Washington State by conducting propensity score and exact matching to ensure adequate covariate balance between the access group and the matched population. To further control for variation between the populations, we applied regression modeling to the matched dataset; a linear regression output shows how one or more independent variables (predictors) are related to a dependent variable (outcome).
The study revealed statistically significant medical cost savings for both the commercial group and Medicare Advantage members enrolled in Regence’s products with access to Dispatch services relative to market products. Total cost savings were calculated using medical per member per month allowed dollars on a 100% of Medicare basis.
The report covers the following topics.
- Results: Key findings from the study comparing medical cost outcomes for the access group population with the matched market benchmark population
- Supplementary analyses: By age band, by metropolitan statistical area, and among members with a Dispatch visit
- Methods: Explanation of data sources, exclusions, cost basis and repricing methodology, and the analysis
- Discussion: Thoughts on Medicare Advantage findings, members with a Dispatch visit, and study design
This report was commissioned by DispatchHealth.