Contents tagged with quality

  • Get MACRA ready with QPP Now: AAFP enhances tools to help you avoid negative payment adjustment in 2019

    Tags: MACRA, QPP, medicare, payment, 2019, 2017, quality, Cost, ACI, IA

    Tuesday, June 27, 2017 3:10:00 PM
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    By Jonathan Nelson

    Amid the daily deluge of news about efforts to repeal Obamacare and the possible passage of the next iteration of health reform winding its way through Congress, it’s easy to forget the looming deadlines associated with Medicare’s Quality Payment Program. But don’t do it! We’re halfway through the year, which means you have only 6 months left to report at least one quality measure or activity in 2017 to avoid being penalized in 2019.

    Your Academy has put together a wealth of resources to help you avoid that penalty and prepare for what’s to come. Bookmark this link in your browser and visit it frequently, as modules are being updated and developed as regulations are modified: http://www.aafp.org/practice-management/payment/macraready.html.

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  • Making the grade

    Tags: hawkins, president's letter, report, quality

    Tuesday, February 18, 2014 1:54:57 PM
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    By Clare Hawkins, M.D., M.Sc.
    TAFP President, 2013-2014

    As I reviewed my children’s report cards recently, I found myself proud of their achievements. I also began reflecting on whether these grades were an accurate reflection of their past performance or current abilities. I know they worked very hard and deserved credit, and that being graded was a great deal of stress for them. Ultimately I found myself being thankful that I was no longer in the educational system where I was frequently under pressure to perform and be graded by teachers and professors. Then I stopped myself and considered the last report I received from a health plan which outlined my performance as a doctor. Unfair! How do they know how good I am? They don’t really know how well I perform.

    Increasingly we physicians find that health plans, governments, or employers are evaluating the care that we provide. Do we know what they are measuring? Will it affect my payments? Will it affect my employment?

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  • What is a good doctor?

    Tags: fiesinger, president's letter, family physician, quality

    Monday, August 19, 2013 7:59:48 AM
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    By Troy Fiesinger, M.D.
    TAFP President, 2012-2013

    Although I missed the blockbuster 2011 Brad Pitt movie Moneyball, I recently read the book by Michael Lewis. Oakland A’s general manager Billy Beane, a promising high school prospect out of California, was drafted by the New York Mets the same year as Darryl Strawberry and Lenny Dykstra. Despite looking like a top prospect to the scouts, Beane’s major league career ended early while Strawberry and Dykstra won the 1986 World Series with the Mets. As the general manager of the Athletics, Beane struggled to define more accurately what makes a baseball player good. This got me thinking: How do I know I’m a good doctor?

    I can point to the diplomas on my wall and tell you I went to good schools, but the U.S. News and World Report rankings are little more than opinion surveys with minimal hard data to back up their lists. I can show you a copy of my Texas medical license, but that just means I haven’t broken any laws nor received any complaints to the Texas Medical Board. You could look at my American Board of Family Medicine diploma, know that I have passed a national exam and do annual online education modules, and consequently assume I know something. You do not know, however, if I am better than the doctors across the street.

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  • TAFP’s top 10 news stories of 2012

    Tags: news, 2012, texas medical board, affordable care act, quality, health care costs, accountable care organization, recovery audit contractor, administrative burden

    Thursday, December 27, 2012 9:01:00 AM
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    As another year draws to an end and we’re once again waiting to see what Congress will do to about the SGR and the fiscal cliff-tastrophy, your TAFP Communications staff put together a list of the top 10 news stories from Texas Family Physician and TAFP News Now based on unique page views recorded through our analytics system.

    Not surprisingly, it shows that family physicians are concerned about the practice environment and the future. These stories outline new regulations, administrative burden, experimental practice and payment models, and the future of the specialty.

    1. TMB rules you may not know but should

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  • A win for the patient-centered medical home

    Tags: quality, family physician, patient-centered medical home, payment

    Friday, February 10, 2012 8:43:24 AM
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    WellPoint, the country’s second-largest health insurance company, is the latest industry leader investing significant funds into the patient-centered medical home. And while none of their 34 million enrollees are Texans, this still adds weight to the argument that spending more for primary care—upwards of $1 billion—will save money down the road.

    Starting this summer, WellPoint will pay primary care physicians more through an increase to their fee-for-service schedule of around 10 percent, by paying them for “non-visit” services currently not reimbursed (like preparing care plans for patients with multiple chronic conditions), and through shared savings payments for achieving quality outcomes and reducing medical costs. Meeting the shared savings goals alone could make a practice eligible to earn 30 to 50 percent more than they earn now for the same service.

    In addition to paying primary care physicians more, the company will enhance “information sharing,” provide care management support from WellPoint’s clinical staff, and incorporate best practices from their medical home pilots, the company said in a press release. In return, the physicians would have to meet additional requirements including expanded access for patients and maintaining a chronic disease registry.

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