Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services announced December 3 that more than 1,550 hospitals will share $1.9 billion in bonus payments under the Hospital Value-Based Purchasing Program for FY 2019. Though it is a slight decline from FY 2018, average performance scores were higher at 38.1%, compared…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on November 27 launched a new online tool that compares Medicare payments and co-payments for certain outpatient surgical procedures performed in hospitals and ambulatory surgery centers. The “Procedure Price Lookup” tool will help Medicare patients consider potential cost differences when…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services should measure surgeon spending at a group level or incorporate multiple years of data to reduce misclassification of surgeon performance in its Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) program, this study finds. University of Michigan researchers found that annual cost-profiles of individual…

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Editor's Note New data from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) shows that 93% of eligible clinicians who participated in the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) under the Quality Payment Program (QPP) received positive payment adjustments for their performance last year, the November 9 EHR Intelligence reports. Only…

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Editor's Note Transitioning from administrative data to chart-based surveillance review to measure hospital-acquired pressure ulcers (HAPUs) and accounting for HAPU severity could improve the validity of measures for assessing the clinical and financial impact of value-based purchasing interventions, this study finds. Assessing HAPU incidence, severity, and trends using administrative data…

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Mandatory implementation of the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems Outpatient and Ambulatory Surgery Survey (OAS CAHPS) originally scheduled for 2018 has been delayed, but that does not mean it should be ignored, say ambulatory surgery center (ASC) leaders. The earliest projected date when the survey could become mandatory…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on October 9 announced that 1,299 healthcare providers are participating in its new Bundled Payments for Care Improvement−Advanced model, which began October 1 and will continue until December 31, 2023. The program includes 32 bundled clinical episodes (29 inpatient, 3…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), on orders from Congress, is easing its annual readmission penalties on hospitals servicing low-income residents, the September 26 Kaiser Health News reports. The penalties are part of the Affordable Care Act’s effort to encourage better care. The sanctions have been…

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Editor's Note Patients who receive care in for-profit hospitals are more likely to be readmitted than patients in nonprofit public hospitals, this study finds. Using data from 14,307 hospital reports from the national Hospital Readmission Reduction Program for six major diseases, including coronary artery bypass grafting and total hip and…

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Editor's Note The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) will be unveiling new payment models centered on high-cost areas as part of ongoing efforts to advance value-based payment (VBP) care, and some models could be mandatory, the September 20 Healthcare Finance News reports. Healthcare providers can expect reduced regulatory…

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