AHA News reports that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services last week sent Congress its plan for implementing a value-based purchasing program for hospitals under the Medicare inpatient prospective payment system beginning in fiscal year 2009, as required by the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005. The agency’s proposal builds on the Medicare pay-for-reporting program implemented in 2005, which requires hospitals to report on specific inpatient quality measures to receive a full IPPS payment update, by including financial incentives for better performance – moving towards value-driven health care. In its report, CMS said the plan “should be implemented in a manner that does not increase Medicare spending.”
A news item in Modern Healthcare yesterday says that CMS quality effort
could put payments at risk, as it would reduce base Medicare payments to hospitals, with hospitals “buying back” that money through high performance.