22 Oct HCTTF Joins Coalition in Support of ACO “Rural Glitch” Legislation

The Health Care Transformation Task Force joined multiple industry coalition letters supporting the ACO “rural glitch” legislation. The Task Force has regularly commented on CMS’s approach to regional adjustment which disproportionately penalizes rural ACOs because their ACO patients are included in the regional comparison. Senator Cortez Masto (D-NV) and Senator Roberts (R-KS) introduced bill S.2648 on October 22nd, 2019; the Rural ACO Improvement Act which would correct this policy by requiring CMS to remove an ACO’s assigned patients from the regional comparison group. The change is dubbed the “rural glitch” because it largely affects rural ACOs, although most ACOs would benefit.

On November 22nd, 2019, Representatives Arrington, DelBene, Marshall, and Bera introduced legislation that fixes a formula to measure accountable care organization (ACO) performance by more fairly comparing ACOs to their Markets. Specifically, the Accountable Care in Rural America Act (H.R. 5212) amends the title XVIII of the Social Security Act to improve the benchmarking process for the Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP) to ensure that all ACOs have an equal opportunity to share in savings regardless of the geographic location.

Read the Letter in Support of S.2648

Read the Letter in Support of H.R. 5212