New West Physicians (New West) is a primary care medical group with 76 providers who serve patients in the western and southern parts of the Denver metropolitan area. It includes 100 primary care health professionals, 70 are physicians, and the practice cares for an estimated 200,000 patients.
Founded in 1994, New West Physicians is the largest primary care practice in Colorado. In 1999, New West Physicians stopped accepting Medicare but continues to accept Medicare Advantage and fee-for-service commercial insurance.
New West operates with a variety of reimbursement structures; however, a hallmark of the group is that it has, almost since its inception, worked with a health plan where it has responsibility for the care of a defined population and is paid based on performance.
Among Medicare patients who are discharged from a hospital, the national readmission rate within 30 days is 18 percent. Among New West patients, the figure is 6.1 percent.
New West employs a number of strategies to reduce hospital utilization – including provision of its own 24/7 hospitalist coverage, aggressive follow-up in home and post-acute care settings to prevent readmissions, and provision of after-hours access to ambulatory care.
Tags: behavioralhealth, denver, health, newwestphysicians