Athenahealth and Louisville, Ky.-based health insurer Humana inked a multiyear agreement to combine the Watertown, Mass.-based EHR vendor’s software with health plan data, according to a Jan. 12 news release. 

Four things to know: 

1. Athenahealth and Humana will integrate supplemental and clinical data in real time to give providers necessary insights to identify potential time-sensitive gaps in patient care. 

2. The collaboration will use data and intelligence tools from Humana to help providers address patient needs within native Athenahealth EHR workflows, which will improve care management discussions between patients and providers and help support quality program performance goals. 

3. The agreement builds on Humana’s current use of Athenahealth’s Real-Time Benefits Check, which lets Humana providers determine a patient’s prescription benefit coverage and provide patients with accurate costs for their medications at the time of prescribing. 

4. With the new integration, providers using Athenahealth can create alerts about upcoming preventive services and help patients manage their health with tools such as automatic appointment alerts. 

“With this collaboration, we will deliver consistent data-driven insights to physicians at the point of care, to help them assess the best treatment options for every patient, especially those suffering from chronic conditions,” Athenahealth CEO Bob Segert said in the news release. “Connecting payers and providers is a vital step toward realizing our vision to create a thriving ecosystem that delivers accessible, high-quality, and sustainable healthcare for all.”