Altru to begin marketing Mayo Clinic affiliation

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Visitors to Altru Health System facilities throughout the region will soon start seeing additional markings touting the health system’s new partnership with the Mayo Clinic.

In addition to the Altru Health System logo, in October Altru marketing materials will begin to also include word mark logos identifying Altru as a member of the Mayo Clinic Care Network. In the near future new signs will also be added to Altru facilities proclaiming Altru’s membership in the new Mayo Clinic network.

The Mayo Clinic Care Network was officially launched and Altru Health System was introduced as the network’s first participating member during a news conference inside the Altru Hospital board room Wednesday.

“We’re excited that the first partner in the Mayo Clinic Care Network is Altru Health System,” said David Hayes, the medical director of the new network. “We see this as a way to extend what already has been a strong relationship with Altru. We already can see the roots getting deeper and deeper.”

An affiliation agreement between Altru Health and the world-renown Mayo Clinic was first announced in May. The two organizations already have started working together to help improve local patient care.

Altru Health will be the pilot organization and the first member of the Mayo Clinic Care Network, a group of independent health care facilities will have increased access to Mayo Clinic expertise and specialists. Altru physicians will be able to consult with Mayo Clinic experts and access the resources and care protocols of the Rochester, Minn.-based health care giant.

Unlike the Mayo Clinic Health System, a network of health care providers in 70 communities in Minnesota, Iowa and Wisconsin, the partnership is unique because it is the first time the Mayo Clinic has formed an official affiliation agreement with a facility it does not own.

Altru is not being acquired by the Mayo Clinic, and the health care system is maintaining local control with local physicians in charge of treating their own patients.

“We will have the expertise of the Mayo Clinic,” said Casey Ryan, Altru’s president. “It allows us to give the best care. We will be able to get patients to the right place at the right time, sooner. We’re doing what’s best for the patient and the community.”

Officials with the two health care organizations said Wednesday that the affiliation will help improve patient care and is expected to ultimately lead to less instances of patients needing to be referred to Mayo. Those who do require specialty care at Mayo also are expected to be diagnosed earlier, which should lead to better patient outcomes.

One tool allows Altru physicians to electronically submit detailed questions about complex conditions and treatments and receive responses with Mayo’s best practices.

Altru also is taking advantage of electronic consultations, allowing physicians to share patient info, symptoms and conditions of selected patients through a portal with the Mayo Clinic. Mayo specialists will review the cases and make recommendations for the patients to continue the same treatment plan, start a new treatment plan at Altru or receive specialty care at Mayo.

If they have questions, Altru physicians also can call and talk directly with Mayo specialists.

Altru CEO David Molmen said in the future it is possible that the electronic consultations also may include a video component for physicians and possibly also patients to talk directly with Mayo specialists through video conferencing capabilities.

Schuster reports on business. Reach him at (701) 780-1107; (800) 477-6572, ext. 107, or email rschuster@gfherald.com. Follow Schuster on Twitter at @RyanSchuster.

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