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CMS to Drop Price of Medicare Provider Data
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS ) will lower the planned price of Medicare provider data under a final rule issued today, after the regional groups that wanted the data to create quality reports complained that previously proposed prices would keep them from participating.
The final rule implements a program—authorized by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act—that allows qualified organizations to access patient-protected Medicare data and produce public reports on physicians, hospitals and other healthcare providers.
Such reports, according to the agency, would combine Medicare claims data with private-sector claims data to identify the physicians and hospitals that provide the highest quality, most cost-effective care to patients.
The changes in the final rule from the original rule proposed in June included a requirement that the provider data cost less than originally proposed for qualified entities.
Under the earlier proposed version, data for 2.5 million beneficiaries would have cost $200,000. The final design would lower the costs for the same number of beneficiaries to $40,000 for the first year and $32,000 for each subsequent year.
Source: Modern Healthcare
