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HHS finalizes streamlined Medicare payment system, ACR responds with statement
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The HHS and CMS finalized a policy on the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System and the Advanced Alternative Payment Model in the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015, which are collectively known as the Quality Payment Program, according to a press release.
The American College of Rheumatology (ACR) recently released a statement in response.
“While we have not had time to review the final rule in its entirety, we are encouraged to see that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is listening to the concerns raised by the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) regarding the need for reporting requirements that are simple, transparent, and tenable — especially for small and rural rheumatology practices,” Joan Von Feldt, MD, MSEd, president of the ACR, said in the statement.
The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) — which replaces the SGR — can transform Medicare payments for more than 600,000 clinicians, according to the release. To develop MACRA, there was a months-long listening tour with close to 100,000 attendees and 4,000 public comments. The final payment system contains two payment options for clinicians. Clinicians can choose to be paid either for providing better care or by participating in organizations that provide better health results while reducing costs.
“Giving providers the flexibility of multiple options for participation in the first and second years will help ensure a smooth transition to the new payment system, and the continued delivery of quality care to Medicare patients living with rheumatic diseases,” Von Feldt said. “We also appreciated the broadening of exemptions from the program, which will help to protect small practices that already struggle to keep up with administrative burdens, along with the reduction in the number of required measures to be reported. We were also pleased to see that qualified clinical data registries (QCDRs) — including ACR’s Rheumatology Informatics System for Effectiveness (RISE) registry — were included as a reporting mechanism that [the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS)]-eligible clinicians and groups can use as intermediaries to submit data on measures and activities, decreasing the burden to individual rheumatologists. Utilizing QCDRs to streamline and integrate quality reporting programs will give providers more flexibility and help realize the shared goal of improving patient outcomes under MACRA.”
Von Feldt concluded by saying the ACR is continuing to examine the rule.
“The ACR’s policy and legislative staff are closely examining the rule to determine whether some of the other key concerns raised by the rheumatology community — such as the inherent problems with the resource use category of MIPS, and the formidable barriers that exclude many rheumatologists from participating in the alternative payment model (APM) track — have been sufficiently addressed.”
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