June Month in Review: Summer Solstice & MACRA Madness!

Dear Members and Friends, 

Summer began with a big splash as we worked closely with our executive members to carefully craft a collaborative response to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) proposed rule for implementing the bipartisan Medicare Access and Chip Reauthorization Act (MACRA). Our candid and concise feedback is necessary as the agency finalizes the regulations, due out in November, which sets in place paradigm-shifting Medicare payment reform for many years to come. Leading a careful, clear, and workable implementation of this historic law is an immense challenge, but its importance cannot be overstated.

Please read our official comment letter to CMS, our press release that provides an overview of our comments, and join us this afternoon for our next National Briefing webinar that will take a deeper dive into the proposed rule and recommendations for improvements, “Payment Reform, Medicare & Primary Care: Why We Have to Care About MACRA & the Proposed Rule” (see details below).

While we commended CMS for its efforts to overhaul health care payment and better reward patient-centered primary care through MACRA, we also offered several specific recommendations for strengthening the proposed regulations in order to simplify, spread, and scale high-performing primary care:

• Expand recognition of patient-centered medical homes;
• Provide multiple pathways for medical homes to qualify as advanced alternative payment models; 
• Acknowledge the challenges of solo and small practices and provide greater support for them;
• Revise the implementation timeline;
• Strengthen beneficiary engagement; and
• Streamline quality measurement by including a parsimonious unified set of quality measures from the Core Quality Measures Collaborative.

Given Medicare’s influence on the U.S. health care marketplace, MACRA’s reach will extend far beyond the confines of CMS and Medicare. As a unique coalition representing health care providers, patients, and payers, the PCPCC stands ready to engage and collaborate with organizations that are keenly interested in payment reform that supports high-performing, team-based, patient-centered primary care for all. If you would like to learn more about joining our Collaborative as an executive member and the many benefits that you can reap, please contact Amanda Holt on our team.

Best wishes for a safe, relaxing, and fun Independence Day!