Medicare’s bundled ortho payments yield modest savings (MassDevice)
Medicare’s randomized trial of a new bundled payment model for hip and knee replacement surgeries led to $812 in savings per procedure, a 3.1% reduction in costs when compared with traditional means of paying for care, according to new research.
The study from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Harvard Medical School found that the bundled payment model was also associated with a reduction in the use of skilled nursing care after hospitalization, but had no effects on complication rates among patients.
Published online today in the New England Journal of Medicine, the study confirms what an earlier Medicare study had found in terms of savings. In September, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced that Medicare payments for lower extremity joint replacement care fell by 3.3% among participating hospitals compared to a control group in the first year of its bundled payment pilot program. Quality of care was maintained in both settings, the federal health insurer said.
“Interest in bundled payments has exploded the past few years,” said Michael Barnett, one ...
