The Federal Financial Forum

From: HHS/CMS

First set of core measures, used as basis for quality-based payments, were developed by new broad collaborative of health care system participants 

Today, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), as part of a broad Core Quality Measures Collaborative of health care system participants, released seven sets of clinical quality measures (https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Quality-Initiatives-Patient-Assessment-Instruments/QualityMeasures/Core-Measures.html).  These measures support multi-payer alignment, for the first time, on core measures primarily for physician quality programs. This work is informing CMS’s implementation of the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA) through its measure development plan and required rulemaking, and is part of CMS’s commitment to ensuring programs work for providers while keeping the focus on improved quality of care for patients.

From: RevCycleIntelligence

By Sara Heath

The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) needs to clarify and revise provisions regarding data blocking on its recent patient-centered EHR use draft bill, according to the American Hospital Association (AHA).

From: Becker’s Infection Control & Clinical Quality

Written by Max Green

A new report issued by CMS outlines the methodology the organization uses to determine its overall star ratings for hospitals, which helps to improve the usability and interpretability of information made public on the hospital compare website.

“CMS developed this methodology with the input of a broad array of stakeholders to summarize results of all measures currently posted on Hospital Compare,” a post on the QualityNet portal reads. The Overall Hospital Quality Star Ratings provide consumers with a simple overall rating generated by combining multiple dimensions of quality into a single summary score.”

From: Nephrology News

REBECCA ZUMOFF

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CMS is creating a formalized review process for dialysis facility five star measures. Like those used for the ESRD QIP, these measures will be vetted by the renal community and the National Quality Forum before implementation.

“We want the measures to impact improvement for patients,” said Andress. The measures will be applied to the Dialysis Facility Compare before being considered for the star ratings. “Because a measure has been approved for the DFC doesn’t mean they will or should be included in the star rating,” he noted.

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From: Brookings

David Wessel

[Brookings] Editor’s note: If you want to know more about blockchain and disruptive financial services technologies after reading this Q&A, watch the Hutchins Center’s live discussion this Thursday at 1:15 p.m. EST. You can register here to receive a reminder about the event. It will be webcast live on the same page.

Bitcoin, the stateless virtual currency, often sounds like something between fad and fraud. But the technology undergirding bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies—both the software protocols that make them work and a “distributed ledger” innovation known as the “blockchain”—may prove to be an enduring development that could significantly alter the way money changes hands around the world.