The uncertainty about the continued existence of ACO’s is over: they are here to stay. The Affordable Care Act (“ACA”), in order to employ quality measures to improve patient care and reduce overall expense, directed the Secretary of Health and Human Services to create a Medicare shared savings program called an Accountable Care Organization (“ACO”). The 429-page ACO regulations, enacted in October 2011, expand on the four pages of the ACA that created the voluntary shared savings program and provide a complex structure for organizations desiring to become Medicare ACOs.
Published in the Letter, a publication of the Louisiana Mutual Medical Insurance Company.
Read the full article here: Accountable Care Organizations: They’re Not Just For Medicare Anymore!