So everyone is talking about value based healthcare. No longer is ‘business as usual‘ even an option on the table as the volume driven FFS zeitgeist continues to lose supporters in health policy circles while a growing body of clinical initiatives from ACOs to a range of variably structured and differentially market positioned risk bearing organizations (RBOs) model the new paradigm.
For some this value based healthcare mantra is code-speak for the associated narrative if not mandate to reflect all payment or delivery system model entries that shift clinical risk to providers whether ‘institutional‘, i.e., hospitals and/or their parent health systems (including IDNs), or ‘professional‘, i.e., physician networks, enterprises, medical groups or their managing agents (MSOs). This pool of value based participants includes a range of ACOs whether participating in the Medicare (MSSP or other options) program or their commercial derivatives as negotiated by many of the national or regional health insurance companies; not to mention ‘OWAs’ (other weird arrangements) that arguably incorporate one or more strategies to play and thrive under a range of risk based incentives.
Contributing clarity to an arguably non-homogeneous market including performance results to date via provider entity type use cases is CAPG (fka as the California Association of Physician Groups) who recently published ‘CAPG’s Guide to Alternative Payment Models: Case Studies of Risk-Based Coordinated Care‘.
This is a timely and resource rich report sourced from an eclectic pool of risk savvy industry players (CAPG members) that CAPG Executives Don Crane, President and CEO, and Mara McDermott, Vice President of Federal Affairs, introduce as follows:
You’ll … learn where each model is successful and strong, and where each has room for improvement. Key areas where CAPG members are demonstrating success in APMs include:
• Improving the quality and efficiency of care for patients. These APMs align physician payment to the achievement of performance objectives.
• Encouraging team-based care and a commitment to primary care.
• Innovating to better meet the needs of patients, particularly those with chronic conditions.
In addition to the significant progress our members are making in improving patient care and innovation, several themes have emerged where there is room for improvement:
• Improving data sharing with payers to continue to drive care improvements.
• Engaging patients in new payment approaches, particularly in accountable care organizations (ACOs).
• Aligning quality measures across programs. This will play an important role in reducing the burden on physician practices and getting actionable information to consumers.
As physicians across the nation embark on this journey toward risk-bearing arrangements, we hope you find this paper a practical, helpful, and invaluable guide.
Most of you will connect and more or less identify with the ‘it takes a village‘ [to raise a child] admonition popularized by the presumptive Democratic Nominee for President, Hillary Clinton. In the grand transformation of a change resistant and to a very large degree legacy inertia driven healthcare financing and delivery ecosystem, this village idea may just be a gross understatement. Rather, I think the then Acting Administrator of CMS Don Berwick got it right scaling the true nature of the challenge before healthcare leadership, which is to steward the market mandated transformation via an ‘all hands on deck, full court press‘ invitation to make this transformation even remotely possible. In other words, this will take much more than just a ‘village‘.
Major props to CAPG for an important body of work on this nascent and ‘learning as we go‘ industry.
acowatch.me 
The induction of ACO’s has shifted the responsibility to the professionals and require that extensive innovation and improvement are made in the use of data and quality metrics. As stated it is important that new methods are used to care of patients with chronic conditions in an effort of shared responsibility. Health information integration will allow better comparison of quality metrics and improved data analysis and application.
Thanks for your comment Mitch. While I agree with your thesis about HealthIT and shared decision making these contributions have yet to make their way into mainstream provider workflows. Some use cases here and there can be cite, but by and larger what you assert is ‘on the come’ and more in the theory than practice domain.