Medicare spending proposal includes positives, negatives for primary care

American Family Physician,  April 1, 2008  

• E-mail
• Print
• Link

President Bush has proposed an initiative aimed at slowing projected Medicare spending. The Medicare Funding Warning Response Act of 2008 would ensure that by 2013 value-based or pay-for-performance measures are available for at least 50 percent of care provided under Medicare. It would also withhold a portion of physician payments based on quality and efficiency standards.

Under the initiative, some quality-related provisions (e.g., those associated with electronic health records [EHRs], pricing transparency, and value-based purchasing) would not be implemented unless they reduce costs. Kevin Burke, director of the American Academy of Family Physician's (AAFP's) Government Relations Division, contends that much of the cost of meeting the pay-for-performance requirement would go to family physicians because many of these measures apply to primary care. He also says the initiative would make it difficult for physicians to receive payments based on the quality and efficiency of their performance. However, some measures in the initiative are positive for family physicians, such as a $250,000 cap on noneconomic damages for medical lawsuits and those related to the use of interoperable EHRs instead of only electronic prescribing and publicizing price and cost information to Medicare beneficiaries. For more information, visit http://www.aafp.org/newsnow/ government-medicine/20080227bushtrigger. html or www.hhs.gov/asl/medicarefundingwarning summary.pdf.

COPYRIGHT 2008 American Academy of Family Physicians
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning