On Thursday, Jan. 26, senior officials at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) posted to the agency’s website a list of CMS’s major accomplishments in calendar year 2022.
The list (see this link) was organized based on four conceptual “pillars” on which CMS officials based their working strategy for 2022: advancing health equity, expanding access, engaging partners, and expanding innovation. A number of the achievements the agency’s officials cited are related to the agency’s “innovation” pillar.
In the “advance health equity” category, officials noted that “CMS released its National Quality Strategy, a cross-cutting initiative that is raising the bar for a high-value health care system that promotes quality outcomes, safety, equity, and accessibility for all individuals, especially those in underserved and under-resourced communities.”
In the “expanding access” category, officials noted that, “In an effort to address concerns with the prior authorization process, CMS published several proposed rules in December 2022 (Advancing Interoperability and Improving Prior Authorization Processes; Adoption of Standards for Health Care Attachments Transactions; and the CY 2024 Policy and Technical Changes to the Medicare Advantage and Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit Programs) with the collective goal to improve the timeliness of access to medically necessary care.”
And in the category of “Innovation,” the officials cited several areas of achievement.
Among other things, “The Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation (Innovation Center) released an update on implementation of the Innovation Center’s strategy refresh to drive the delivery system toward meaningful transformation and deliver person-centered care that meets people where they are. More than 110,000 providers participated in the Innovation Center’s Traditional Medicare models, and more than 4.7 million people with Traditional Medicare received care from providers in these models. Additionally, approximately 900,000 people with Medicaid received care from a provider, plan, or organization participating in an Innovation Center model.”
In addition, “The CMS Innovation Center released its sixth Report to Congress, representing activities from October 1, 2020 through September 30, 2022.”
And, “CMS advanced toward our goal of having all people with Traditional Medicare in an accountable care relationship with their health care provider by 2030. The Calendar Year 2023 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule final rule, and the redesign of the Accountable Care Organizations’ (ACO) Realizing Equity, Access, and Community Health (REACH) model, illustrate how CMS is implementing a shared ACO vision of a health system that achieves equitable outcomes through high quality, affordable, personcentered care across different ACO programs, by using the Medicare Shared Savings Program as a chassis for growth. CMS finalized changes to the Medicare Shared Savings Program, the nation’s largest ACO program that, in 2022, covered more than 11 million people with Medicare and included more than 500,000 health care providers. These policies represented some of the most significant reforms since the program was established in 2011.”
In addition, “As part of the President’s Cancer Moonshot priority to support patients and caregivers, CMS announced the Enhancing Oncology Model to transform the way the health care system treats cancer patients. The Model places cancer patients at the center of the care team and provides support for navigating a cancer diagnosis, treatment, and survivorship.”
