CMS has launched the official website for its Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, a new department within the agency that's tasked with developing and testing new payment systems and policies that will reduce costs and improve patient outcomes.
More commonly called the "Innovation Center," this department will be a "much-needed driver of innovation aimed at improving health care for Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries," said Acting Innovation Center Director, Richard Gilfillan, MD, in a prepared statement. "The center will identify and test care models that provide beneficiaries with a seamless care experience, better health and lower costs."
The center is already beginning to test several projects:
- Integrated medical homes demo. Eight states have been selected to participate in the Multi-Payer Advanced Primary Care Practice Demonstration that will test whether integrated care by physicians who received coordinated payment from Medicare, Medicaid and private payers can save money and boost health outcomes. Maine, Vermont, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Michigan, and Minnesota are the participating states, but this demo will eventually include more than 1,200 medical homes serving nearly 1 million Medicare patients.
- Community health centers demo. Up to 500 federally qualified health centers (FQHCs) will participate in the FQHC Advanced Primary Care Practice Demonstration which aims to test the effectiveness of providers working in teams to treat low-income patients at community health centers. About 195,000 Medicare patients will be impacted, while Medicaid patients with at least two chronic conditions can choose to sign up for a new state plan that would allow them to designate a provider as a "health home" that would coordinate their treatment.
- Dual-eligible state programs. Though this is in its infancy, the Innovation Center is looking to award up to $1 million to as many as 15 state programs for developing a program to treat patients eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid. More information on dual-eligible initiatives will be announced next year, CMS says.
"For too long, health care in the United States has been fragmented-failing to meet patients' basic needs, and leaving both patients and providers frustrated," said CMS Administrator Donald Berwick, MD, in a statement. "Payment systems often fail to reward providers for coordinating care and keeping their patients healthy reinforcing this fragmentation. The Innovation Center will help change this trend by identifying, supporting, and evaluating models of care that both improve the quality of care patients receive and lower costs."