CMS touts promise of two primary care initiatives

Based on first year results, the CMS says its two advanced primary care initiatives show promise for saving money and improving health-care quality.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services in a Jan. 23 blog post said the Comprehensive Primary Care (CPC) initiative reduced hospital admissions by 2 percent and emergency department visits by 3 percent and cut expenditures “nearly enough to offset care management fees paid by CMS.”

The agency also said its Multi-payer Advanced Primary Care Practice (MAPCP) Demonstration generated an estimated $4.2 million in savings through the use of advanced primary care initiatives.

The CPC initiative is a multipayer partnership between Medicare, Medicaid private health-care payers and primary care practices in four states and three regions. The MAPCP Demonstration is a multipayer initiative in which Medicare is participating with Medicaid and private health-care payers in eight advanced primary care initiatives in Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Vermont.