Dr. Randall Lee on next steps for value-based care framework in urology

In this video, Randall A. Lee, MD, shares the take-home message from the European Urology Focus study, “Transition to Value-based Healthcare: Development, Implementation, and Results of an Optimal Surgical Care Framework at a National Cancer Institute–designated Comprehensive Cancer Center.” Lee is as an assistant professor in the Department of Urology at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and a member of the Fox Chase-Temple Urologic Institute.

Transcription:

What are the next steps for this research?

I think we hit a little bit of a hiccup when the COVID-19 pandemic came; I think that altered a lot of spending and allocation of resources. But I think now that times have become more normal, we can pick up and continue that process. Our goal is to expand the cost analysis into our other procedures. In this study, we included prostatectomy, and it's one of the procedures that we looked to optimize further and to see how we're doing from a financial standpoint. Another field that we did not include is bladder cancer; we felt that bladder cancer had a lot of variability in how it's managed from a non-muscle-invasive to a muscle-invasive disease process. And I think expanding this into the bladder cancer space will go a long way as well.

What is the take-home message for the practicing urologist?

I think for the practicing urologist, as health care continues to expand and reach more people, we really have to shift our focus toward providing higher quality of care for our patients, especially urologists that are focused on treating an aging population [where there are] more issues. We know that these type of payment models—the bundled payments, the time-centered payment models—haven't been well investigated in urology, whether that [is due to] the complexity of the procedures or our patient population. But I think our paper is a good start. I think by applying these metrics that we've outlined in our manuscript, it's a perfect steppingstone in allowing urologists to take that step toward providing value-based care.

Is there anything you would like to add?

One of the things that I'd just like to mention is that health care is constantly changing, with legislation and how we manage patients. And as it changes, we as providers also have to change and adapt to that, because like I said, the way we're trending with the spending, it's really not sustainable. So we really have to develop a system in which we focus on value, and we are smarter in how we allocate that spending.

This transcript was edited for clarity.