How Firsthand Scaled Medicaid Care with
Real-Time Data from Zus

Medicaid care teams can’t wait 90 days for claims.

Real-time hospitalization alerts, fresher med data, and fewer faxes transformed how Firsthand supports Medicaid members with serious mental illness.

Firsthand

2x

reduction in fax volume

30-day

pharmacy delay removed

6-month

visibility gap closed at launch

Overview

Firsthand delivers peer-led, trust-based care for individuals on Medicaid with serious mental illness. Their model depends on timing. Reaching members right after a hospitalization or missed refill, not months later.

Before partnering with Zus, Firsthand’s teams were working with stale, fragmented data. Claims took 30–90 days to arrive. Records trickled in by fax. Each delay meant lost time and missed opportunities to intervene.

With Zus, they now get real-time alerts, structured medication data, and complete clinical records that power faster, more coordinated care.

The Challenge

Delayed Data, Missed Opportunities

Before Zus, Firsthand faced three major obstacles to scaling care:

Hospitalization visibility

ER and inpatient events surfaced up to 90 days late through claims.

Medication blind spots

Pharmacy fills lagged 30 days, creating dangerous adherence gaps.

Manual record retrieval

Staff spent hours faxing hospitals and providers for missing data.

The Solution

Real-Time Clinical Insights That Scale

Zus unified data from HIEs, ADT feeds, and national record networks so Firsthand could see every encounter as it happened.

Hospitalization alerts trigger case reviews within hours of an ER visit.

Up-to-date medication data fuels daily outreach and adherence programs.

Nationwide records access via Carequality/
CommonWell slashes fax volume and accelerates care planning.

Expansion support
Zus manages new HIE connections as Firsthand enters new markets.

The Impact

Faster Interventions,
Stronger Outcomes

Firsthand has seen clear results across clinical, operational, and financial dimensions:

Reduction in manual faxing volume

“Without Zus, our faxing would’ve doubled”

Real-time case reviews
Hospital and discharge data now flow directly into Firsthand’s high-risk workflows.

“We rely on the Zus profile for every high-risk case review”
Smarter outreach around medication adherence
Fresher fill data enables outreach before disengagement turns into crisis.

"We use refill data to intervene at potential disengagement points. This allows us to maintain a sticky, high retention rate for members, because we engage them at a moment of need."

Why it Works

Clinician adoption: Care teams love having a complete picture instantly.

Flexible foundation: Firsthand layers its own algorithms on top of Zus data.

Built for growth: Zus sets up new HIE feeds before Firsthand launches in a new market.