The Impact of Personalized Preventive Care on Health Care Quality, Utilization, and Expenditures

Abstract

The objective of this study was to evaluate the impact on health care utilization and expenditure trends over time of a personalized preventive medicine program delivering individualized care focused on lifestyle behavior modification, disease prevention, and compliance with quality-related metrics. MD-Value in Prevention (MDVIP) is a network of affiliated primary care physicians who utilize a model of health care delivery based on an augmented physician-patient relationship and focused on personalized preventive health care. Multivariate modeling was used to control for demographics, socioeconomics, supply of health care services, and health status among 10,186 MDVIP members and randomly selected, matched nonmembers. Health care utilization and expenditure trends were tracked from the pre period prior to member enrollment for a period of up to 3 years post enrollment. MDVIP members experienced reduced utilization of emergency room and urgent care services compared to nonmembers. Program savings ranges indicated that, over time, increasing percentages of members achieved cost savings compared to nonmembers. Older age groups were more likely to realize savings in the early years with preventive activities indicating condition management, and younger age groups were most likely to achieve savings by the third year after enrollment. These results indicate that a primary care model based on an enhanced physician-patient relationship and focused on quality and personalized preventive care within a time frame of 3 years can achieve positive health care expenditure outcomes and improved health management.