ACOs

UNITED HEALTHCARE SHARES THAT ACO RESULTS ARE “VERY STRONG” Earlier this quarter, Sam Ho, Executive Vice President and CMO (Chief Medical Officer) for United Healthcare has shared publicly that ACO results appear to be very strong, up to 6% lower in total cost of health care. United has contracts with more than 450 ACOs and continues to work on the consumer side of the value based insurance design. In similar …

Commercial Insurers Continue To Position The Value of ACOs With value-based arrangements established through ACOs in full swing, commercial insurers are continuing to work aggressively to move providers in this direction. According to top executives at leading insurers and analysts who follow the value-based health care industry, value based care can potentially offer insurers and providers with a huge advantage in the market. According to Leavitt Partners LLC Director of …

  New Hospitals and Health care providers join the Affordable Care Act initiative   Last week, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services made the announcement that 121 new participants joined the Accountable Care Organization (ACO) initiative designed to improve the quality of healthcare offered to beneficiaries while lowering overall costs. According to the Department of Health and Human service (HSS) Secretary Sylvia M. Burwell, ““Americans will get better care …

The Next Generation ACO Model This is a new initiative from The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) which takes the top Pioneer ACO companies and builds a model of best practices under the Shared Savings Program. This new model sets a benchmark, where beneficiaries can align themselves to the ACO and evaluates the beneficiary incentives of seeking this type of next Generation providers. ACO Participants in this model …

Changes to ACO Benchmarks proposed to ACOs   As an effort to further the success of ACOs and improvement in health care, The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has announced that it wishes to move away from current ACO benchmarks. Instead of basing them on historical spending, they would like to analyze trends in regional fee-for-service costs. According to Andy Slavitt, current administrator for the CMS,“Medicare payments are …

New Year, new ACOs. 100 New ACOs as of January 1, 2016 New Year, new ACOs. 100 New ACOs as of January 1, 2016 It has been reported that as of January 1, 2016, the Medicare Shared Savings Program welcomed 100 new ACOs. It is estimated that approximately 15,000 more physicians will be participating with Accountable Care Organizations. This represents 434 ACOs, helping service more than 7.7 million beneficiaries. According …

An Overview of ACO Models Many healthcare professionals wonder about the Accountable Care Organization (ACO) models that have been established by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). We have summarized the main ACO models below.   Medicare Shared Services Program. This program otherwise known as (MSSP), is meant to establish coordination among providers and the beneficiaries to reduce costs. Those that are eligible to participate in this program …

ACOs, Improvement in Quality Care and Generating Shared Savings With the rise of ACOs across the country, many physicians and doctor offices are beginning to ask questions around the impact of the Affordable Care Act. We have outlined some data that could help provide insight in regards to ACOs. This past August www.cms.gov, issued quality and financial performance results from the year prior proving that there is financial data that …