CMS
NEWS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 25,
2015
Contact: CMS Media Relations
(202) 690-6145 | CMS
Media Inquiries
Medicare
ACOs Continue to Improve Quality of Care, Generate Shared Savings
The Centers for Medicare &
Medicaid Services today issued 2014 quality and financial performance results
showing that Medicare Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) continue to improve
the quality of care for Medicare beneficiaries, while generating financial
savings. As the number of Medicare beneficiaries served by ACOs continues to
grow, these results suggest that ACOs are delivering higher quality care to
more and more Medicare beneficiaries each year.
“These results show that
accountable care organizations as a group are on the path towards transforming
how care is provided," said CMS Acting Administrator Andy Slavitt. “Many
of these ACOs are demonstrating that they can deliver a higher level of
coordinated care that leads to healthier people and smarter spending.”
ACOs are one way that the
administration is working to provide Medicare beneficiaries with high-quality,
person-centered care. Medicare ACOs are groups of doctors, hospitals, and other
health care providers who voluntarily come together to provide coordinated care,
with the goal of giving Medicare beneficiaries – especially the chronically ill
– the right care at the right time, while avoiding unnecessary duplication of
services and preventing medical errors.
The results shared today
demonstrate significant improvements in the quality of care ACOs are offering
to Medicare beneficiaries. ACOs are judged on their performance on an array of
meaningful metrics that assess the care they provide – including how highly
patients rated their doctor, how well clinicians communicated, whether they
screened for high blood pressure and tobacco use and cessation, and their use
of Electronic Health Records. In the third performance year, Pioneer ACOs
showed improvements in 28 of 33 quality measures and experienced average improvements
of 3.6% across all quality measures. Shared Savings Program ACOs that reported
quality measures in 2013 and 2014 improved on 27 of 33 quality measures.
When an ACO demonstrates that it
has achieved high-quality care and effectively reducing spending of health care
dollars above specified thresholds, it is able to share in the savings
generated for Medicare. In 2014, 20 Pioneer and 333 Shared Savings Program ACOs
generated more than $411 million in savings, which includes all ACOs savings
and losses. Today’s results show that ACOs with more experience in the program
tend to perform better over time. Of the 333 Shared Savings Program ACOs, 119
are in their first performance year in Track 1, which involves standing up the
program without the financial risk associated with later tracks. Please see
accompanying fact sheet for more details about percentages of ACOs that share
in savings over time.
The number of beneficiaries served
by ACOs is likely to continue to grow. Since the advent of the programs, the
number of Medicare beneficiaries served by ACOs has consistently grown from
year to year, and early indications suggest the number may grow again next
year. The Shared Savings Program continues to receive strong interest from both
new applicants seeking to join the program as well as from existing ACOs
seeking to continue in the program for a second agreement period starting in
2016. Since passage of the Affordable Care Act, more than 420 Medicare ACOs
have been established, serving more than 7.8 million Americans with Original
Medicare as of January 1, 2015.
The Affordable Care Act takes
important steps toward a more accessible, affordable, and higher-quality health
care system. Today’s announcement is part of a broader effort to seize on this
historic moment and transform our health care system into one that works better
for the American people. We have a vision of a system that delivers better
care, spends our dollars in a smarter way, and puts patients in the center of
their care to keep them healthy.
For more detailed quality and
financial results, click here.
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