The ACO proposed rules: A party starter or a party killer?
Hospitalist Leadership Connection, May 18, 2011
We all anxiously, and many hopefully, waited and watched as the CMS proposed rules for the accountable care organizations (ACO) were being prepared. Now that the rules have been released and many have had a chance to read them, what I’m hearing from hospitalists and administrators alike is a collective state of disappointment.
Some common observations that surround the ACO new rules: too much regulation, not enough potential or risk sharing, and too much investment involved. The general feeling among those I’ve been talking to is that there will be muted participation in the ACO program because of all the barriers to entry.
For example, there are 65 quality measures that all must be met to qualify for any shared savings. How many practices can accurately collect and report data on even just a few Physician Quality Reporting Initiative (PQRI) metrics? Another challenge is that 50% of providers in an ACO must meet the meaningful use definition for electronic health records. This represents a very large investment by physician practices regardless of size, many of which are not prepared to take on this burden.
Read more of this blog post by Kirk Mathews, CEO, principal, and founder of Inpatient Management, Inc., on MedicalStaffLeader.com.
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