Under a contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), CMS and Mathematica partnered with 22 Medicare Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) participating in the Shared Savings Program and in the Next Generation ACO Model to identify the strategies that ACOs use to engage health care providers in the ACO and in quality improvement activities. The resulting practices and strategies helped form the Provider Engagement Toolkit, an array of innovative provider engagement strategies that Medicare ACOs use to deliver value-based care. The toolkit includes information on how ACOs:
- Communicate with providers about the ACO as a value-based care organization
- Use data to identify and address opportunities for improving care
- Offer customized support to primary care providers and specialists
- Implement financial incentives
“Clinicians are the heart of ACO operations,” said Project Director Kate D’Anello. “This toolkit highlights some of the innovative ways in which ACOs are working with providers to transform care delivery, reduce costs, and improve quality for CMS and for their patient populations.”
The Provider Engagement Toolkit is part of a broader series of resources that explore different aspects of how ACOs provide value-based care. Through this and other toolkits, CMS aims to not only educate the general public about strategies ACOs use to provide value-based care, but also to present actionable ideas to current or prospective ACOs to help them begin or improve operations, particularly as they consider shifting to two-sided risk models.
For more information about this toolkit and other resources highlighting ACO initiatives, including the previously released Beneficiary Engagement and Care Coordination Toolkits, as well as a series of ACO case studies, please visit the CMS Innovation Center website.
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