Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project

May 7, 2012
Consumers and Purchasers Weigh In On Meaningful Use

Twenty-six consumer and purchaser organizations praised CMS for moving Meaningful Use in the right direction in a letter to the agency and a press release. They also called on CMS to maximize health information exchange, and rapidly develop high value quality measures and build them into the program.

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March and April, 2012
CPDP Comments on a Variety of NCQA Programs

The National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) recently closed a comment period for their Physician and Hospital Quality Update. CPDP submitted comments that were overall supportive with some suggested modifications. NCQA also solicited comments on their proposed update to the NCQA Accreditation and Certification Process. In its comments, CPDP pointed to the opportunity for NCQA to align with federal quality reporting requirements for qualified health plans operating in the Exchanges. Finally, NCQA solicited feedback on their proposed Technical Specifications for ACO Measures. CPDP submitted comments that called for more innovation in the measure dashboard and reporting at the provider level (in addition to aggregate ACO).

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March 29, 2012
CPDP Meaningful Use Strategy Session

CPDP held a strategy session to highlight gains and opportunities for improvement in the Meaningful Use (Stage 2) proposed rule. We expect opposition to some of the gains and strongly encourage consumers and purchasers to voice their opinions. The session's recording and slides are available for download.

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January 13, 2012
CPDP weighs in on Medicare Advantage Quality Bonus Payment

In 2012, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) starts its three-year Medicare Advantage Quality Bonus Payment (QBP) demonstration to financially reward Medicare Advantage (MA) plans that provide high-quality care. The demonstration will also make information on the quality of MA plans available on the Medicare Plan Finder website, with quality indicated via a star rating system. Recently, CMS sought input on QBP's methodology and measures. In a move that supports greater transparency, the agency proposed adding quality measures that extend beyond health plans to hospitals and other settings. In a letter, CPDP encouraged CMS to leverage QBP to fulfill Congress's intent for MA plans: to operate more efficiently than traditional Medicare fee-for-service plans, without sacrificing quality. CPDP stated that new measures for the star rating system should be meaningful for consumer-decision making and drive plans to pursue high-value care, including those focusing on mortality, readmissions, and patient safety.

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January 2012
Effort to Drive Value-Based Purchasing

One of the core priorities of the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project is to promote alignment, across public and private sector purchasers, of strategies and tools for accomplishing value-based purchasing (VBP) that improves health care quality and bends the ever-rising cost curve. While both CMS and private purchasers currently use innovative VBP tools, there is very little cross-fertilization across private sector purchasers, or between the public and private sectors. To better leverage the progressive work being done and share best practices, we are excited to announce a new Value-Based Purchasing Initiative composed of the nation's leading business groups on health, consumer organizations, several large employers and union health funds. Funded by The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Initiative will conduct outreach and provide assistance to private purchasers to enable a change from fee-for-service, volume-based payment model, to one based on value. The Disclosure Project is assisting with the overall coordination of the project. In its first phase, the Initiative will develop and make available tools to help private purchasers work with each other, as well as with Medicare, to promote and implement successful VBP. These tools will include (1) a request for information to acquire standardized health plan information that purchasers need in order to implement VBP; (2) creation of a web-based data platform to collect information on VBP methods, measures and contract language; and (3) an analytical review of VBP payment methods already in use; and (4) a paper summarizing federal antitrust guidelines that may affect purchasers' efforts to work together, to enable purchasers to pursue their efforts most efficiently and effectively.

Please check back here for updates on this new project, and click here to view documents related to the issues being tackled by this project.

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October 31, 2011
Consumers and Purchasers Comment on Proposed Rules for New Health Insurance Exchanges

In July, HHS released a proposed rule beginning the process of developing guidance to the states as they develop the Affordable Care Act-mandated Health Insurance Exchanges for individuals and small businesses. In response to the proposed rule, 23 consumer and employer organizations submitted a comment letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). The comments reflect their support for HHS to require states to incorporate strong quality, cost and value information in their consumer assistance tools, including the web portals and cost calculators. The letter also discusses the need for strong consumer and purchaser representation on the Exchange governance boards, and the need for meaningful conflict of interest rules to ensure that those who govern the Exchanges do so with consumers' and employers' needs in mind. Finally, the comments discuss the need for Small Business Health Options Program (SHOP) exchanges, which will provide new choices for employees of small businesses beginning in 2014, to include the same level of quality and cost information for consumers. In addition to the comment letter, the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project held an informational webinar on the topic of Exchanges, based on the comments being submitted. For just the slides from this webinar, click here.

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September 20, 2011
PBGH Medical Director Arnie Milstein, MD Shares His Expert Opinion In the Wall Street Journal

The Wall Street Journal published an opinion piece from PBGH Medical Director Arnold Milstein and CPDP member Robert Krughoff, along with George Shultz, explaining that the release of public data from the Medicare program is an important step towards publicly reporting information on how well physicians care for their patients. To that end, the authors urge HHS to be judicious in the restrictions, burdens, and costs associated with distributing data in order to maximize accessibility for the public.

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September 16, 2011
Setting Higher Standards To Advance Meaningful and Usable Measures of Performance

Consumers, purchasers, policy-makers, and other stakeholders seek improved quality and affordability in our health care system. A strong set of meaningful and usable performance measures is an essential tool in this pursuit, yet we do not have enough of these measures. In response, the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project developed "Ten Criteria for Meaningful and Usable Measures of Performance," which lays out practical actions that those working in measurement can take to drive the development and implementation of robust performance measures. It includes recommendations on a dashboard of measures that provides a complete picture of care and how measures should be constructed to generate more valuable information.

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September 15, 2011
Getting "Good Value" Health Care

David Hopkins, Ph.D., Senior Advisor to PBGH and the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project joined community members in Humboldt County to launch Care About Your Care, a month-long effort to raise awareness about what consumers can do to identify and get better health care. In this presentation, Dr. Hopkins discusses the tenuous connection between cost and quality in our current health care system and explains how more care, and more expensive care isn't always better care. Dr. Hopkins offers practical advice for consumers, providers, health care leaders and community leaders about how they can improve the quality and affordability of health care in this country.

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August 30, 2011
Consumers and Purchasers Commend Proposed New Rules Affecting Quality of Care Delivered in the Medicare Outpatient and Ambulatory Surgical Center Settings, and the Hospital Value-Based Purchasing Program

In a letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), 28 consumer, labor, and employer organizations voiced their strong support for proposed regulations to outpatient and ambulatory surgery center quality reporting programs. The organizations expressed support for measures on patient safety, outcomes, and diabetes care. For the new Hospital Value-Based Purchasing Program, organizations strongly supported CMS' proposal to make outcome measures count for 30 percent of hospitals' total scores and reducing the weight given to clinical process measures. The proposed rule can be found here.

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August 30, 2011
Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project advocates for CMS to set higher standards for how physicians are rewarded and evaluated

In a letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), 29 consumer, labor, and purchaser organizations urged the agency to strengthen the proposed Physician Fee Schedule by being bolder in paying physicians for value and assessing performance. They recognized the agency's recent strides in both areas and call for changes that will have a significant and lasting impact on bending the cost curve and improving quality.

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August 8, 2011
Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project Applauds CMS' Commitment to Release Medicare Data

Consumer-Purchaser coalition sends comment letter representing 38 organizations urging CMS to make data widely available to maximize public benefit

When Americans choose a doctor or hospital, they have little or no information to help them judge the quality of care they're likely to receive. This could change with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' (CMS) proposed rule to make Medicare data available for publicly reporting the performance of doctors and hospitals. The proposed rule would implement requirements set by Congress in the Affordable Care Act. The Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project, joined by 38 leading consumer, labor, and employer organizations, applauds the efforts of CMS to make the data available and provided comments on the proposed rule today.

"Patients have a right to know about the quality of the medical services they receive; their health -- and even their life -- is on the line," explains Bill Kramer, Executive Director of National Health Policy for the Pacific Business Group on Health and co-chair of the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project. "Before going into a hospital for surgery, wouldn't you want to know its rates of infections, complications, unnecessary readmissions, and deaths?"

The Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project urged CMS to modify the proposed rule to ensure that Medicare data is more broadly available for use, as long as patient privacy and data security are protected. The letter voiced strong support for permitting the maximum public benefit from the information allowed under the law. The letter also expressed support for making the data more affordable for access by qualified organizations.

"This data has the potential to be enormously beneficial to consumers, and to the system as a whole," says Debra L. Ness, President of the National Partnership for Women & Families and co-chair of the Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project. "Data should be widely available to organizations that will use it to spur improvements in our health care system that benefit patients, consistent with adequate privacy and security protections. Now is the time to put consumers in the driver's seat and give them the information they need to make informed health care decisions."