Health systems and ACOs: Prepare yourself for the return to cost containment as the central objective of Value-Based Care in 2025. While cost measures have always been part of CMS Value-Based Care quality programs, their impact was small relative to the total MIPS score for physician groups. Likewise, ACO savings look big in dollars but […]
To Unlock ACO Access to Real Savings, Start with Trusted Data
Value-Based Care payment models are based on a clear CMS goal: lower Total Cost of Care and its counterpart, Total Per Capita Cost. But neither TCoC nor TPCC gives you the information you need to target your cost efforts. How to start? Begin by evaluating what initiatives you need to do in the five key […]
How Your ACO Can Optimize APP Reporting Using Medicare CQMs
ACOs just gained a reprieve from implementing all-patient APP quality reporting in 2024. A provision in CMS’s Physician Fee Schedule Final Rule, which goes into effect on January 1, 2024, enables ACOs to report on Medicare patients only, based on CMS provision of eligible patient lists for three APP measures. If your ACO decides to […]
The 2024 CMS PFS Final Rule: Post-PHE, Value-Based Care Returns to the Forefront
The 2024 Physician Fee Schedule Final Rule—all 2,709 pages worth—was released on November 3, and the significance of the “Post-COVID” rule cannot be understated. With the Public Health Emergency expiring earlier this year, these finalized policies are intended to get the proverbial train back on its tracks, following the massive derailment in March 2020. Although […]
5 Tips for a Win-Win Collaboration Between ACOs and Specialists
As Value-Based Care expands, payers are emphasizing cost reduction all the more. Newer CMS payment models like ACO REACH reinforce cost control by capping reimbursement in total global payments to ACOs. In turn, global payments enable ACOs to directly negotiate rates with preferred provider specialists. In addition to focusing on controlling costs delivered through primary […]
How AI May Help – and Hurt – Your ACO
Artificial Intelligence (AI) advances are big news, but the daily onslaught of AI applications in health care is overwhelming. There’s no question that health care is fertile ground for AI. Health care is expensive, highly technical, complicated, and equally frustrating for patients and providers alike. It’s also rich in data—a mostly untapped resource for both […]
Three Data-Driven Approaches to Engage Specialists in ACOs
All ACOs, regardless of payment model, are built on a vision of primary care services to patients. Medicare attributes patients to your ACO based on the plurality of primary care services. CMS attributes a patient to a participating specialist only if the patient has not seen a primary care physician in the ACO or at […]
Supercharge Your ACO to Compete Under Risk
Never has it been more important for ACOs to amp up Value with significantly higher cost savings and outcomes performance. More payment models are risk-based, changing economics for providers. Corporate health care and equity-backed practices are nabbing ACO physicians, making it hard for ACOs to sustain and grow. The next two years may be the […]
Promote ACO Success Under Value-Based Payment with These 5 Data Sources
ACOs have used “old school” data sources for many years to focus coordination of care activities. Perhaps your ACO has done the same, using reports such as admissions and ER discharges, post-acute admissions, visit history and missing labs to target patients for outreach. Similarly, your ACO might use HCCs to identify patients with higher risk […]
Prepare Your ACO for APP Reporting with Our Ultimate Guide
No way out. That’s the message of the CMS 2023 Final Payment Rule regarding APP quality reporting for ACOs. ACOs hoping for a reprieve to avoid all-patient quality reporting did not get it. APP Reporting will go forward by 2025, and ACOs must aggregate the patient data from provider systems to enable it. CMS has […]