What's in a name?
Last week, the group known as the Disease Management Association of America and, more recently, DMAA: The Care Continuum Alliance, changed its name to the Care Continuum Alliance. "We have evolved with our members toward a whole-person approach to care that keeps the healthy well, reduces disease risk and helps those with chronic conditions manage their health," alliance President and CEO Tracey Moorhead explained in a press release (.pdf).
While I didn't have any advanced news that such a change was forthcoming, it makes perfect sense to me, and not just because of the former DMAA subtitle. The care continuum really should involve more than just disease management. It should incorporate wellness and lifestyle components in addition to traditional, physician- and hospital-driven healthcare.
In the context of health IT, care coordination is a part of the continuum as well, as many others have begun to discover.
The most prominent example that I like to cite is Dr. Adam Darkins, who heads telehealth programs at the Department of Veterans Affairs. His title happens to be chief consultant for care coordination.
Think about that for a second. What the VA and Darkins are trying to convey is the idea that telehealth is about more than just the technology, but really a tool to help coordinate--and thus deliver better--care. The DMAA was thinking in the same spirit when it chose to drop "disease management" in favor of "care continuum." After all, isn't disease management ultimately just one part of the broader idea of a continuum--one that really needs coordination and health information exchange to thrive? - Neil