“We have an amazing team that steps in when and where they are needed to ensure our beneficiaries receive the care they deserve.” – Cindy Sconce, TriWest’s director of referral management
TriWest’s Alaska Operations Hub in Anchorage jumped into action recently to coordinate emergency medical flight transport for a critically fragile newborn to Seattle Children’s Hospital for urgent intensive neonatal care.
Due to medical complications at birth, the TRICARE West Region newborn needed urgent specialty care at the nearest Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). Unfortunately, NICU care was not available near the delivering military treatment facility (MTF).
Adding to the emergency, NICU care does not exist anywhere within the TRICARE Alaska Operations territory.
At close to 6 p.m. March 27, the Alaska Hub team suddenly had an urgent emergency medical flight situation on their hands. Their quick action and resourcefulness became essential for coordinating the critical newborn’s needed care and supporting a family’s future relying on their success.
An Urgent Call for Emergency Flight Transport
When the newborn’s emergency condition arose, Zoya Lee-Zerkel, TriWest vice president of Alaska Operations, became aware of the urgent need for NICU care at the nearest available facility. At the time, the only medical option required a more than three-hour emergency air and ground transport to reach the NICU at Seattle Children’s Hospital.
Alerting her team of the newborn’s emergency, Zoya immediately reached out over a TriWest Teams chat group for urgent TRICARE emergency flight approval and coordination.
The newborn’s need for the intensive neonatal care and the medical request propelled the Alaska Hub to put in action their growing experience with handling emergency medical situations.
“This was the fourth air ambulance request our team has worked on since the start of TRICARE delivery in January,” Zoya says. “Immediately engaging with the requesting military treatment facility to develop a complete situation assessment is always our first step. We then focus on contacting all essential parties for information. We have to act quickly to expedite the emergency authorization and coordination.”
“TriWest’s Alaska Operations Hub is a uniquely experienced team,” Zoya emphasizes. “Our Field Support Specialist Cassidy McDonnell came to the role with more than five years of experience supporting MTF and health care operations in Alaska. Building on her experience, we developed key procedures to navigate urgent and emergency situations that occur in Alaska. Throughout this potential crisis, our team quickly responded according to our procedures.”
Assembling and Coordinating Emergency Care
Monitoring the TriWest Teams chat, Cindy Sconce, TriWest’s director of referral management, quickly jumped into action.
With limited access to needed information, Cindy understood the urgency to succeed. Spotting Zoya’s call for the newborn’s emergency flight authorization and coordination, Cindy quickly located a recent beneficiary case for the newborn in TriWest’s integrated care management platform.
With quick thinking and resourcefulness, Cindy soon discovered there was already a previous pending authorization request for the newborn TRICARE beneficiary. She realized the pending request could be used to quickly piece together details and produce a new emergency medical flight authorization.
“My immediate thought was to ensure we gathered enough information on this newborn,” Cindy says. “We needed to be able to accurately and quickly process the air transport authorization to get this newly born patient to intensive neonatal care.”
Cynthia Fleetwood, TriWest Referral Operations Center manager, built an urgent authorization while Cindy provided emergency transport coordination support. Together they worked to finalize the emergency authorization details including a LifeMed Alaska flight to Seattle and ground transport on both ends of the flight.
A little more than 90 minutes later, shortly after 7:30 p.m., the urgent authorization request for emergency flight of the newborn and parent was finalized. The Alaska Hub team quickly confirmed all transport details were arranged, including both air ambulance and ground transport for departure of the newborn and parent the next morning.
“Time was essential, so working through the hurdles one at a time was the most effective process. We have an amazing team that steps in when and where they are needed to ensure our beneficiaries receive the care they deserve,” Cindy emphasizes.
“There is always a sense of relief and satisfaction when we are able to take care of all of our beneficiaries, from the Active Duty to newborn babies. We have great respect for all our beneficiaries and will go above and beyond to ensure that their needs are met.”
A TRICARE Medical Emergency Support Success Story
Despite the critical newborn’s initial health difficulties, the Alaska team’s emergency flight coordination demonstrates how TRICARE processes successfully work for beneficiaries, even in emergency situations.
Similar urgent situations can occur at other partner military care facilities any day. The newborn’s emergency medical flight coordination is testament of how team members exemplify TriWest’s Whatever it Takes!® culture. TriWest serves to ensure all TRICARE beneficiaries receive the prompt service and care they deserve.
The Alaska Hub team came through under pressure with sudden urgency when a fragile newborn and a growing military family’s future was on the line.
“Our greatest satisfaction was receiving a message from the military treatment facility sharing how thankful the baby’s father was that they would soon be on their way to definitive care,” Zoya emphasizes.