Industry Insights

After several months of negotiations you've reached agreement with a contract physician group to provide hospitalist services in your hospital. This group has particular expertise in helping patients with multiple comorbidities and focuses on making sure that those patients get into the proper post-acute setting, which you hope will improve your performance in the Medicare Bundled Payment for Care Improvement (BPCI) CHF and COPD episodes in which you’re participating.

At the National Bundled Payment Summit in Washington DC last June, we presented a session on risk and opportunity in bundled payments. Jon Pearce from Singletrack Analytics gave an overview of risk and opportunity in bundled payments, while Jessica Walradt from the Association of American Medical Colleges and Lily Pazand from NYU Langone Medical Center discussed successes and challenges in their related organizations.

CMS has made the option available to BPCI participants to have their targets for the Major Joint Replacement of the Lower Extremity episodes stratified by whether the patient had a hip fracture. This issue is of concern to some BPCI participants because episodes involving fractures are considerably more costly than non-fracture episodes. While non-fracture episodes may cost $20-22,000, fracture episodes are typically 45-50% higher at $35-40,000.