CMS Selects The Lewin Group for Project to Reduce Hospital Readmissions

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has selected The Lewin Group, a Falls Church, Va.-based consulting firm, to help reduce the number of hospital readmissions for Medicare beneficiaries, and improve quality and outcomes when patients transition from hospitals to other settings, such as their homes or long-term care facilities.

CMS awarded The Lewin Group, an OptumInsight company, $2.3 million for the first year of a 5-year program to assist hospitals and community-based organizations participating in the Community-based Care Transitions Program (CCTP). The program’s goals include: improving the transition of Medicare beneficiaries from inpatient hospitals to home or other care settings; improving the quality of care; reducing hospital readmissions for high-risk beneficiaries; and achieving measurable savings for the Medicare program, the nation’s federally-funded health insurance program for Americans 65 and older.

The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) estimates that the cost to Medicare for readmissions to hospitals is about $15 billion, of which as much as $12 billion is thought to be preventable through improved care. The federal Partnership for Patients, a new public-private initiative, will provide funding for care transition services delivered to high risk Medicare beneficiaries, a service that is not currently reimbursable under the Medicare program. Successful care transitions are expected to save the Medicare program billions of dollars over the next several years.