Partnering for Impact: Strategy 4

Genacross Lutheran Services⁴⁸ demonstrated this strategy by creating the Radiant Alliance. Genacross, which provides services including housing and behavioral health in Ohio and Michigan, recognized that MCOs required robust outcome data and service capacity before engaging in value-based payment arrangements. Instead of attempting to engage MCOs individually, Genacross partnered with Ohio’s Hospice and United Church Homes to establish the Radiant Alliance. The explicit purpose of the Alliance is to build scale and market presence across Ohio to negotiate value-based payment arrangements more effectively, share data platforms, and coordinate programming.⁴⁹

Forging this path required navigating a complex ecosystem. In Ohio, MCOs serving integrated Medicare-Medicaid (dual-eligible) populations are required to contract with state-funded Area Agencies on Aging (AAAs) as core partners.⁵⁰ Recognizing that AAAs were the incumbent, preferred partners, Genacross took a collaborative rather than competitive approach. They engaged in discussions with both MCOs and AAAs to demonstrate how their “Genacross Connect” service, which utilizes data collected through screening to allow providers to coordinate preventive care management for identified needs rather than respond reactively to emergent medical conditions, could be integrated into the existing AAA network, thereby adding value for all parties rather than disrupting established relationships.

By aggregating their capabilities, the Alliance secured a major strategic affiliation agreement with an MCO in Ohio, in June 2023. CareSource was specifically interested in how the Alliance could assist with population health management, reducing care costs, and providing transitional housing and youth programming—needs that required the coordinated strength and data infrastructure offered by the Alliance structure.⁵¹

Lutheran Social Services of Illinois (LSSI) has also utilized this strategy as a founding member of the Illinois Health Practice Alliance (IHPA).⁵² This alliance, which includes LSSI and other social service and healthcare provider organizations in the area, was explicitly developed to transform Illinois’s outpatient behavioral health network to deliver better value to patients, providers, and payors. Through IHPA, LSSI gained increased scale and negotiating power with multiple Managed Care Organization (MCO) partners in Illinois, including Centene, Meridian, County Care, and Aetna.

The Alliance operates under a value-based care model designed to align the financial success of IHPA health and social service providers with its MCO members’ primary goals of cost containment and quality metric performance. Under this arrangement, LSSI can receive rewards for meeting defined performance metrics and earn shared savings payments if the Alliance successfully reduces the total cost of care for patients. IHPA specifically targets high emergency department and inpatient psychiatric utilizers for improved outcomes. The Alliance has demonstrated its effectiveness, producing HEDIS quality-care measurements between 2021 and 2023 that ranked in the 90th percentile nationally. Additionally, providers participating in IHPA achieved a 32% improvement in completed care transitions and a 41% improvement in completed risk assessments during the Alliance’s first year of operation.⁵³

Both Radiant Alliance and IHPA models serve as a blueprint for how independent organizations can leverage collaboration to secure access to large payors and funding streams, strengthening their collective ability to participate in alternative payment models. SSOs must also understand that integrating with existing state-mandated structures, like Area Agencies on Aging for senior services, may require proactive partnership through these alliances to avoid being sidelined as MCOs follow state contracting rules.