Introducing 'Best of CMIO' Fridays
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The most popular story this week was our report on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) yet again delaying the launch of RAC prepayment audits. CMS has vowed to give physicians 30 days' notice prior to the program's start.
The prepayment demonstration was set to start June 1 in 11 states but CMS received push back from many specialty groups, including the Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI) and the American Medical Association (AMA), among others. The groups argued that the RAC demo could threaten access to care and “inappropriately utilize the RACs,” according to SCAI.
Another popular story was about actuarial firm Milliman’s release of an accountable care organization (ACO) cheat sheet to guide stakeholders through the ins and outs of Medicare Shared Savings Program and the Pioneer ACOs.
“Healthcare costs have been on the rise over the last few years and there are growing concerns over the financial stability of the Medicare program,” wrote author Robert Parke, principal, consulting Actuary at Milliman, and colleagues. “There are also concerns regarding the aging of the baby boomers, the increase in average age of enrollees and an insufficient tax base to cover future funding of the Medicare program. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act attempts to address some of these growing concerns by implementing laws and programs aimed at reducing healthcare costs. The Medicare Shared Savings Program as well as the Pioneer program are two such initiatives.”
Parke and colleagues wrote that providers may want to form ACOs and participate in these programs for many reasons, including the need to increase or maintain market share and the possibility of sharing in savings resulting from improved care coordination.
In response to the exploding mobile technology industry, President Barack Obama has declared a presidential mandate directing federal agencies to implement such technology within the next 12 months.
Obama issued a memorandum on the federal strategy, “Digital Government: Building a 21st Century Platform to Better Serve the American People,” ordering that each federal agency deploy at least two government services available to the public via mobile technology. The policy paper outlines a 12-month roadmap for agencies.
“The strategy will enable more efficient and coordinated digital service delivery by requiring agencies to establish specific, measurable goals for delivering better digital services; encouraging agencies to deliver information in new ways that fully utilize the power and potential of mobile and web-based technologies; ensuring the safe and secure delivery and use of digital services to protect information and privacy; requiring agencies to establish central online resources for outside developers and to adopt new standards for making applicable government information open and machine-readable by default; aggregating agencies' online resource pages for developers in a centralized catalogue on www.data.gov; and requiring agencies to use web performance analytics and customer satisfaction measurement tools on all '.gov' websites,” the president wrote.
That’s all for this week. Although they’re probably far from lazy for you, enjoy your summer days.
Beth Walsh
CMIO Editor
bwalsh@trimedmedia.com
Beth Walsh,
Editor
Editor Beth earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master’s in health communication. She has worked in hospital, academic and publishing settings over the past 20 years. Beth joined TriMed in 2005, as editor of CMIO and Clinical Innovation + Technology. When not covering all things related to health IT, she spends time with her husband and three children.