SAGAMORE Health Network, Inc. Licenses MCAP Clinical Criteria.

Business Editors and Health/Medical Writers

WELLESLEY, Mass.--(BW HealthWire)--March 11, 2002

The Oak Group today announced it has been awarded a contract to license its MCAP Criteria to SAGAMORE(R) Health Network of Carmel, Indiana. This multi-year license encompasses MCAP Medical/Surgical and Behavioral Health Criteria. SAGAMORE will use MCAP Criteria to help assure patients receive services at the most appropriate level of care. This means that care is provided in the setting best able to meet the patient's individual needs in the safest and most cost-effective manner.

"We chose MCAP because it facilitates a constructive dialog between reviewer and provider," said Becky Richey, SAGAMORE's Director of Medical Management. "MCAP is a useful tool in determining appropriate levels of care and assisting the reviewer in a logical thought process. MCAP helps us focus on how and where to provide the high quality, safe, and cost effective care that a specific patient needs."

According to Dr. David Maltz, president and CEO of The Oak Group, "MCAP is designed to approximate a medical director's approach in reviewing a level of care decision. Rather than focusing down onto one or two quantifiable metrics, MCAP guides an evaluation of the overall clinical and treatment needs of the patient. Therefore, MCAP provides as good or better care management while resulting in far fewer overrides than other systems produce."

MCAP Criteria are tight and clinically relevant, and accommodate co-morbid conditions because the criteria parallel the decision-making process of an expert reviewer. MCAP is fast and easy to use, and, more importantly and distinctively, MCAP does not second-guess treatment decisions.

The Oak Group offers clinical Criteria and software that meet today's critical care management needs for providers, insurers, and hospitals. Its MCAP Criteria are used by case managers, utilization managers, and physician advisors for over 25 million covered lives across the US and Canada.

SAGAMORE Health Network is the largest managed health care company of its kind in Indiana. Over 725,000 people currently access SAGAMORE's network of over 200 hospitals and 23,000 physicians and other medical care providers. SAGAMORE's network is "accessed" through contracts with over two hundred health insurance companies, third party administrators, self-insured firms and Health & Welfare trusts.