Concentra Adds National Expertise To Improve Health Care

Addison, TX - As consumers become more responsible for a greater proportion of their routine health care costs, and as employers look for ways to improve employee health, productivity, and job satisfaction, Concentra is expanding its offerings.

Concentra, a leading provider of health care services, has announced the addition of three national experts to lead development of the company's TotalCare and Urgent Care service lines. Since its founding as an occupational health company in 1979, Concentra has helped employers reduce health care expenditures while working as an advocate for patient health and safety. As consumers become more responsible for a greater proportion of their routine health care costs, and as employers look for ways to improve employee health, productivity, and job satisfaction, Concentra is expanding its offerings with TotalCare and Urgent Care.

'Concentra TotalCare
TotalCare is Concentra's newest service offering that focuses on preventing illness and injury, promoting health and productivity, and lowering the total cost of health care. TotalCare offers employers a customizable menu of primary, preventive, occupational, and environmental services that is focused on their employees' health. To help communicate the primary elements of this service offering, Concentra TotalCare employs the term "Well. Fit. Safe": Well encompasses health screening, education, targeted lifestyle interventions, and clinical preventive care; Fit includes fitness assessments, coaching, and enhanced physical activity; and Safe refers to the promotion of environmental health and occupational safety measures.

• Amy J. Khan, M.D., MPH, serves as medical director for the company's TotalCare and Wellness services. She provides support, oversight, leadership, education, and coordination of these services for local medical directors, physicians, and any providers affiliated with Concentra's health management products. Khan earned her medical degree from Wayne State University School of Medicine and her Master of Public Health (MPH) from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She is specialty boarded in Internal Medicine and General Preventive Medicine & Public Health, and is certified in Addiction Medicine. Prior to joining Concentra, Khan served as a medical officer at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for six years, identifying at-risk populations, measuring disease burden, and providing prevention recommendations. A recognized expert in population health management and integrated clinical care, she has over a decade of health care delivery experience. She previously directed a multidisciplinary clinical service line within a large managed care organization, which served workers and dependents impaired by substance-use problems, and also developed and managed a heart disease prevention program directed at public safety officers and government workers.

  Says Khan, "Concentra developed TotalCare in response to our employer clients who were asking for a comprehensive approach to employee health care. We have a very real opportunity to shift the paradigm of how health care is communicated, delivered, monitored, and measured. By helping employees take increasing responsibility for their individual health and wellness, Concentra can be a driving force in improving the health of Americans."

• P. Mona Khanna, M.D., MPH, has joined Concentra as a strategic advisor and spokesperson for TotalCare and Wellness services. A triple board-certified physician, Khanna is also a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Her medical specialties are in occupational medicine, preventive medicine, and internal medicine. "Dr. Mona," as she is popularly known based on her broadcast and online medical reports, earned her medical degree from the University of Illinois College of Medicine, and her master of public health (MPH) degree from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. She is the physician consultant for ICYou.com (dubbed the You Tube of health care). Khanna has been an international emergency medical aid volunteer for 10 years, with past deployments including medical screenings for Kosovo refugees, treatment for first responders at Ground Zero after September 11 attacks and Alaska Airlines Flight 261 crash, care for tsunami survivors in Sri Lanka and Indonesia, and treatment for victims of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in New Orleans and southeast Texas. She has received the Physician Recognition Award from the American Medical Association four consecutive times, in addition to approximately 50 honors for her medical journalism. Her passion is health education.

  "I want to work with Concentra to empower people to lead healthier lives. Most Americans spend most of their waking hours at work and perform at very high levels. Concentra is uniquely positioned with medical expertise and operational know-how to help provide a solution to our nationwide epidemic of obesity and its negative trickle-down effects on our lives – at work and at home."

  Concentra Urgent Care
  This year, Concentra began offering urgent care services to the general public in 40 Concentra Medical Centers in eight states. Urgent care provides treatment for injury and illness on a walk-in basis with extended hours and convenient locations near patients' home and work. Staffed by physicians and offering X-ray and limited lab services on-site, Concentra Urgent Care saves time and money over the emergency room and offers night and weekend coverage for primary care. Concentra continues its national rollout of urgent care services and plans to offer some form of urgent care service in each of its 320-plus medical centers by the middle of 2008.

• Alan A. Ayers has joined Concentra as Assistant Vice President of Product Development. He will support the development and implementation of consumer-oriented health care solutions such as Urgent Care. He serves as content advisor to the Urgent Care Association of America and is co-author of Consumer Driven Health Care. Prior to joining the company, Ayers was chief operating officer of a hospital-affiliated urgent care network with eight locations. He has extensive experience in the retail consulting industry with clients including Wal-Mart, McDonald's, and Bank of America. Ayers graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and earned a Master of Business Administration from the University of Mississippi and a Master of Accounting from The Ohio State University.

"Concentra understands the challenges facing health care in the United States and is responding with solutions to make health care more accessible and affordable," says Ayers. "By adding urgent care to our existing occupational medicine operation, we will significantly enhance our national presence in the consumer health care arena."

SOURCE: Concentra