New federal initiative puts quality over quantity as focus of patient care

A new federal initiative recently announced by the Medicare Accountable Care Organization (ACO) will make the quality of care for patients more important than quantity of procedures administered.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services stated that 121 hospitals and health-care providers have joined the ACO program to cut costs and make the patients the focus of better care.

ACOs were started with the idea to move the system away from rewarding hospitals and health-care providers for the quantity of services rendered, instead giving them incentives for the quality of their work. ACOs consist of doctors and hospitals that create a plan to make the patient the focus of the health-care delivery system. The basis of this plan is not how many tests and procedures are done on the patients, but the success rate of the administered treatments.

ACOs have proven that their methods work, not only by delivering better care to patients, but also by saving money. In 2014, the combined total savings was $411 million for 333 Medicare Shared Savings Program ACOs. These same programs have also improved in 27 of 33 quality measures categories during that time.