THINC's Pathway to Accountable Care Organizations

 

Accountable care organizations (ACOs) have recently appeared as a health care delivery model with potential to slow rising health care costs and to improve quality.  An ACO is a way to formally bring together a set of non-affiliated providers, ideally including primary care physicians, specialists, community health centers, long-term care facilities and hospitals, and hold them accountable for the cost and quality of care delivered to a defined population of patients.

 

Beginning in 2012, Medicare will fund projects to test the ACO model for its beneficiaries.  Private insurers have also begun to express interest in the concept.  For this reason, THINC launched an education program in 2011 to help interested Hudson Valley providers learn more about the infrastructure requirements of ACOs and, as appropriate, enable providers to participate in CMS's ACO demonstration projects. This work was funded by a grant from the NYS Health Foundation.  Click here to access information from these programs.

 

THINC has produced a white paper entitled "Building ACOs and Outcome Based Contracting in the Commercial Market: Provider and Payor Perspectives. " 

Click here to download a copy of this paper.

 

Resources

 

Below are resources from the Department of Health and Human Services, the Federal Trade Commission, and the IRS on the ACO regulations:

 

Final Rule for Medicaid Shared Savings program: Accountable Care Organizations

Final Waivers in Connection with the Medicare Shared Savings Program

IRS Fact Sheet on the Medicare Shared Savings Program