The Blue Cross cardiovascular consortium celebrates 25 years of improving patient outcomes

December 9, 2021

Twenty-five years ago, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan partnered with five hospitals to launch the percutaneous coronary intervention registry, a collaborative effort to improve quality, cost and outcomes of angioplasty procedures. Since then, the initiative has grown into a statewide consortium of nearly 50 hospitals and 600 physicians, now called BMC2 (Blue Cross Blue […]

Improving vascular care in Michigan: What to do when the simpler option turns out to be less safe, more costly

March 1, 2021

Years ago when atherectomy was introduced as an option to remove plaque in the arteries, the hope was that it would be a less costly option because the procedure could be performed in an outpatient setting. In Michigan, other artery-opening methods of balloon and stent angioplasty must be done in a hospital that has an […]

Study: More people are receiving coronary revascularization under the Healthy Michigan Plan

April 4, 2018

Thanks to the rich amount of data available through the cardiovascular and cardiothoracic surgery CQIs, researchers at Michigan Medicine found that Michigan’s Medicaid expansion has helped more patients obtain needed heart surgery or angioplasty procedures. In addition, those newly insured with Medicaid had no increase in complications, length of stay or mortality. “Despite the concern […]