UT Musculoskeletal Institute awarded international Value-Based Health Care Prize
June 8, 2023
The Musculoskeletal Institute at the UT Health Austin medical clinic received the 2023 Value-Based Health Care Prize from an international jury for its innovative approach to patient-centered health care.
The Value-Based Health Care Prize recognizes medical initiatives from around the world that employ a “fundamentally new line of thinking in creating excellent patient value in terms of real outcomes,” according to its website. Nominees for this year included initiatives from Australia, Italy, the Netherlands and Brazil.
The Musculoskeletal Institute not only treats musculoskeletal disorders but is also pioneering a new way to deliver medicine. According to executive director Karl Koenig, most healthcare services are reimbursed through a fee-for-service system that requires a separate fee for each doctor’s visit, lab and surgery. The institute instead argues for a condition-based care model where one fee is paid to the healthcare team at the beginning of care to incentivize better resource allocation toward the patient.
“On the ground, at least in our team, that means a multidisciplinary team,” Koenig said. “We have orthopedic surgeons, physician’s assistants, chiropractors, physical therapists, social workers, all working on one team so that when the patient comes in, we can provide all of the care that they might need.”
Koenig said the institute uses a very different metric for measuring success as they focus less on the number of patients they see or the number of surgeries they perform and instead rely on patient-reported outcomes.
“We ask our patients to tell us how much their hip and knee pain, back pain or neck pain is affecting their quality of life, and then we measure our success on the patient telling us how much better we help them get on average,” Koenig said. “It is really revolutionary.”
Koenig said the institute ultimately tries to employ a holistic yet pragmatic approach to medicine application by addressing musculoskeletal conditions in the context of a patient’s overall health.
“We help a lot of patients to stop smoking, we help a lot of patients to lose weight, we help a lot of patients to become more active with our physical therapy programs, and sometimes we do surgery on those patients to help them get more active and stay healthy, but we’re really keeping our eye on the prize,” Koenig said. “And the north star is how do we actually help people to be healthier rather than just take care of them when they get sick?”
Koenig said the Musculoskeletal Institute was previously recognized in the U.S. for its trailblazing work, but to be compared to peers worldwide and come out on top shows a lot.
“It says a lot about the University of Texas, it says a lot about Dell Medical School and UT Health Austin that we are in the midst of building new programs, starting a new medical school and staying true to our mission to really revolutionize the way that patients get and stay healthy,” Koenig said.
