The White House's effort to advance alternative payment models will release a report Tuesday that measures the use of APMs and the movement toward paying for the quality, not quantity, of care. The Health Care Payment Learning and Action Network, also known as LAN, is a public-private partnership that aims to grow the use of APMs.
HHS Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell will announce the results at a LAN summit Tuesday titled "Aligning for Action." A statement from LAN says the report is one of the largest and most comprehensive of its kind and will show “that progress is being made across the country.”
Alternative payment models are a key part of the new program for reimbursing Medicare doctors. They are being pursued by public and private health plans focused on moving away from the typical fee-for-service approach to paying for healthcare.
The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act encourages providers to participate in APMs by offering a 5% bonus to those in qualifying programs. Examples of APMs include accountable care organizations, shared-savings programs and bundled-payment arrangements.
Having reached its goal of tying 30% of U.S. healthcare payments to APMs in March of this year, the CMS, through the LAN is now working toward 50% by the end of 2018.
The CMS has pushed these models at a dizzying pace for providers, who recently asked the agency to slow down and spend more time evaluating the proposals that have already been implemented.
Industry organizations and lawmakers have expressed concern that the models are being pushed too quickly and sometimes with mandatory participation. This puts them at odds with the CMS, which has highlighted the work of its innovation center in developing new models and promoting them as the future for the industry.
LAN is comprised of some industry heavy-hitters that include Dr. Sam Nussbaum, a former vice president and chief medical officer at Anthem; and Dr. Mark McClellan, the former CMS and Food and Drug Administration head who is now a Duke University professor.
