Squire Sanders attorneys, Chris Gordon, a Principal in the Washington, D.C. office, and Rob Nauman, a Senior Associate in the Columbus, Ohio office, were recently interviewed by Modern Healthcare for their take on the relaxation of the interim final rule on waivers of fraud and abuse laws and the antitrust policy statement on ACOs. Their … Continue Reading
Today at 2:00 P.M. (EDT), please join Squire Sanders and Strategic Health Care for our complimentary webinar overview of the final rule recently released by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the opportunities it presents for Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs). Speakers will include our own John Kirsner and Peter Pavarini as well as … Continue Reading
This post has been contributed by Chase Matson, Manager, Government Relations, AMDR When we published last week’s blog post, Medicare ACO Rules Near Final Hurdle, we knew it would only be a matter of time before CMS released its final ACO regulations. Sure enough, only two days later, CMS officially published their long-anticipated rules, ending … Continue Reading
On Thursday, November 3rd, please join Squire, Sanders & Dempsey and Strategic Health Care for a complimentary webinar overview of the final rule recently released by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the opportunities it presents for Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs). As reported by the Accountable Care Forum, CMS made significant changes in … Continue Reading
On October 20, 2011, the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission jointly issued their “Final Statement of Antitrust Enforcement Policy Regarding Accountable Care Organizations Participating in the Medical Shared Savings Program.” The policy statement, which largely mirrors the agencies’ proposed policy statement issued on April 19, 2011, outlines how the agencies will enforce U.S. … Continue Reading
Concurrently with the release of the final rule for accountable care organizations participating in the Medicare Shared Savings Program (“MSSP”), the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (“CMS”) and the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General (“OIG”) released an interim final rule with a comment period addressing waivers of certain fraud … Continue Reading
On October 20, 2011, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (“CMS”) released the nearly 700-page, final rule for payments to health care providers and suppliers participating in accountable care organizations (“ACOs”) under the Medicare Shared Savings Program (“MSSP”). In response to approximately 1,320 public comments to the proposed rule, the final rule makes a number … Continue Reading
By Daniel J. Vukelich, AMDR Many healthcare executives may still be on the fence about the future impact of accountable care organizations (ACOs), but most of them still believe their institutions will ultimately join an ACO, according to FierceHealthcare‘s report on the results of a survey released by U.S. News and Fidelity Investments earlier this week. According … Continue Reading
The American Medical Association (AMA) recently issued its comments to CMS relating to the proposed Medicare Shared Savings Program ACO regulations. The comments cover numerous areas of the proposed regulations, and overall, the AMA makes clear its concern that the program as currently proposed provides insufficient incentives for physician participation. While acknowledging that the ACO … Continue Reading
By Daniel J. Vukelich, AMDR Earlier this week, HealthLeaders Media addressed the Top 10 Clinical Integration, ACO Physician Questions. Noting that physicians may be skeptical of new ACO arrangements, want to know how ACOs will impact their patients, and frankly how doctors will get compensated, the authors list the top ten most frequently asked questions about clinical integration (CI) and … Continue Reading
I recently co-presented a session regarding ACO’s with Tony Colarossi of Plante Moran. We presented to the Michigan Hospital Association Excellence in Governance Fellows. The audience consisted of hospital board members who participate in the fellowship program. The board members were from hospitals large and small. The audience was keenly interested in the topic and … Continue Reading
We already know our John Kirsner as a frequent speaker and blogger regarding how CMS’ Accountable Care Organization regulations would impact health care delivery. Seeing Modern Healthcare’s Joe Carlson recognize him as such is further affirmation that Squire, Sanders, & Dempsey is building on its well deserved reputation as thought leaders in the future of … Continue Reading
We love seeing our bloggers gain recognition. Today, Dan Vukelich, blogger and President/CEO of the Association of Medical Device Reprocessors offers an insightful bylined news article that headlines today’s Hospital Informer, a Fierce Healthcare news outlet distributed to 15,000 hospital management subscribers. The article offers an understanding of how the FDA-approved practice of third party reprocessing for certain … Continue Reading
The results from the five year “Group Practice Demonstration” project, which incentivized ten leading health systems if they could reduce costs by “treating older patients more efficiently while providing high-quality care,” were reported June 1 in the Washington Post. Although the article acknowledges that the test does not completely reflect the blueprint for ACOs eventually offered by CMS, … Continue Reading
At a recent briefing on ACOs, sponsored by Alliance for Health Reform and The Commonwealth Fund, a senior CMS official acknowledged what many in the provider community have been grumbling since the ACO proposed rules were released in March that the ACO program, as currently projected, sets too high a bar for participation and provides insufficient rewards … Continue Reading
By Sharon Bee Cheng, Strategic Healthcare The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI) recently unveiled the Pioneer Accountable Care Organization Model. This program is intended to complement—not replace—the ACOs developed under the Shared Savings Program (SSP) authorized in Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. About thirty organizations will be chosen as Pioneer ACOs; letters of … Continue Reading
Last Thursday, CMS announced four free “accelerated development sessions” (ADSs). CMS describes the ADSs as “providing executives with the opportunity to learn about core functions of an Accountable Care Organization (ACO) and ways to build their organization’s capacity to succeed as an ACO. This 3-day, in-person ADS is to help new ACOs deliver better care … Continue Reading
By Sharon Bee Cheng, Strategic Healthcare Cash bonuses for ACOs will be funded by the savings they generate for the Medicare program. However, ACOs will not receive the entire portion of savings they are entitled to unless their performance on quality measures is among the best in the country. Each ACO will be measured on … Continue Reading
Following the release of the ACO regulations by CMS and the concurrent release of guidance documents from the IRS, FTC, DOJ and OIG, much of the attention of the health care industry has been focused on the practical implementation of ACOs, tax considerations, fraud and abuse concerns, improved quality of care, and the potential for … Continue Reading
By Sharon Bee Cheng, Strategic Healthcare I’m honored to be asked by the team at to offer some of our firm’s insight into what CMS is seeking in its regulations governing ACOs. CMS hopes that the formation of ACOs will prompt some reorganization of health systems, even the most integrated ones. Organizations that already substantially … Continue Reading
1:15PM—The workshop concluded a few minutes ago. Overall, I suspect that most people present or who listened or viewed the webcast would agree that the discussion was helpful and certainly many excellent points were brought forward to the regulators. Particularly in the second session, the regulators asked many probing questions, a good sign of their … Continue Reading
Yesterday, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) presented an hour-long webinar on ACOs and Antitrust, Stark Law, Anti-Kickback Statute (AKS) and Civil Monetary Penalty Law (CMP), hosted by Troy Barsky, Director, Division of Technical Payment Policy and Michael Wroblewski, Performance-Based Policy Payment Staff for CMS. Troy Barsky addressed Stark, AKS and CMP laws. … Continue Reading
A tip of the hat to David Kopans, www.accountablecareforum blogger and Squire Sanders lawyer, for his post on Fierce Healthcare’s Hospital Insider titled:”Eight Things Hospital CEOs Should Know about The ACO Regulations.” David’s analysis has the #ACO Twitter community abuzz; and it’s great our bloggers are being recognized for analysis on ACO regulation impact on … Continue Reading
CMS is on the clock first, with a free webinar titled, “ACOs and Antitrust, Stark, Anti-Kickback, & Civil Monetary Penalty Law Webinar.” Hosted by Troy Barsky, Director, Division of Technical Payment Policy at CMS and Michael Wroblewski, Performance-based Policy Payment Staff, the event is broken into two sessions this Thursday, May 5th, the first beginning … Continue Reading
