IMPROVING QUALITY OF CARE FOR MEDICARE PATIENTS: ACCOUNTABLE CARE ORGANIZATIONS

On March 31, 2011, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), proposed new rules under the Affordable Care Act to help doctors, hospitals, and other health care providers better coordinate care for Medicare patients through Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs).  ACOs create incentives for health care providers to work together to treat an individual patient across care settings – including doctor’s offices, hospitals, and long-term care facilities.  The Medicare Shared Savings Program will reward ACOs that lower growth in health care costs while meeting performance standards on quality of care and putting patients first.  Patient and provider participation in an ACO is purely voluntary.

This fact sheet describes the proposals to ensure that ACOs provide high quality care, including proposed quality measures, and a proposed method for scoring the performance of the ACO for purposes of the Shared Savings Program. There will be a 60 day public comment period on this proposed rule. CMS encourages all interested members of the public, including providers, suppliers, and Medicare beneficiaries to submit comments so that CMS can consider them as it develops final regulations on the program.

Background:

The Medicare Shared Savings Program, which is to be implemented on January 1, 2012, is intended to encourage providers of services and suppliers (e.g., physicians, hospitals and others involved in patient care) to coordinate patient care and improve communications with each other to get each beneficiary the right care at the right time, and see that the care is provided right the first time.  To accomplish this, the Act allows providers to create ACOs that will be held accountable for improving the health and experience of care for individuals, improving the health  of populations, and reducing the rate of growth in health care spending.  Studies show that better care often costs less, because coordinated care helps avoid unnecessary duplication of services and preventing medical errors.

Proposals For Assessing Quality Included in the ACO Proposed Rule:

Proposed Quality Measures:  For 2012, CMS proposes to use a number of quality measures to establish the quality performance standard ACOs must meet in order to share in savings, provided they also meet the program’s cost savings requirement. These 65 measures span five quality domains: Patient Experience of Care, Care Coordination, Patient Safety, Preventive Health, and At-Risk Population/Frail Elderly Health.   The list of proposed measures is included in the appendix to this fact sheet. 

CMS considered a broad array of process and outcome measures would help in assessing an ACO’s success in delivering high-quality health care at both the individual and population levels.  Several of the proposed quality measures align with those used in other CMS quality programs, such as the Physician Quality Reporting System, the Electronic Health Record (EHR) Incentive Program, and the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting Program. CMS also sought to align the proposed ACO quality measures with the National Quality Strategy and other Department of Health and Human Services priorities.  CMS proposes that the measures would be reported to CMS through a combination of claims submission, data collection using a tool designed for clinical quality measure reporting, and surveys.

CMS is proposing to define the first quality performance period as beginning January 1, 2012 and ending December 31, 2012. 

Proposed Quality Performance Scoring: As required by the Affordable Care Act, before an ACO can share in any savings created, it must demonstrate that it is delivering high quality care.  Thus, a calculation of the quality performance standard will indicate whether an ACO has met the quality performance goals that would allow it to be considered eligible for shared savings.  The proposed method for scoring the measures and determining the performance level that must be achieved to share in savings under the Shared Savings Program is described in the proposed rule.

CMS proposes that the performance on each measure will be scored on a linear points scale and roll up into 5 scores for each of the 5 domains. The percentage of points earned for each domain will be aggregated using an equal weighting method to arrive at a single percentage that will be applied to the maximum sharing rate for which the ACO is eligible. 

For the first year of the Shared Savings Program, CMS proposes to set the quality performance standard at the reporting level. This means that during the first performance period, ACOs will be required to report the quality measures completely and accurately in order to share in savings. However, CMS proposes to still score quality in the first year for informational purposes and to help define the benchmarks for future program years. CMS proposes to set the quality performance standard at a higher level in subsequent years.

Proposed Incorporation of the Physician Quality Reporting System into the Shared Savings Program:   The Affordable Care Act allows CMS to incorporate the Physician Quality Reporting System reporting requirements and incentive payments into the Shared Savings Program. ACO participant providers/suppliers who are also Physician Quality Reporting System eligible professionals may earn the Physician Quality Reporting System incentive as a group practice under the Shared Savings Program, by meeting its quality performance standard   

The Shared Savings Program NPRM will appear in the April 7, 2011 issue of the Federal Register.  CMS will accept comments on the proposed rule until June 6, 2011 and will respond to them in a final rule to be issued later this year.  The Shared Savings Program will begin operating on January 1, 2012.

For more information, please see:

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APPENDIX

Proposed Quality Measures for Accountable Care Organizations

For First Year Of The Medicare Shared Savings Program

Patient/Caregiver Experience Domain: