CMS P4P program shows improvements

Hospital costs and mortality rates are going down under CMS's pay-for-performance project, according to a new analysis. Under the Hospital Quality Incentive Demonstration project, which began in 2003, the median hospital cost per patient has declined by more than $1,000 across the first three years of the project. What's more, the median mortality rate went down by 1.87 percent. The Premier healthcare alliance, which manages the project, reached this conclusion after analyzing more than one million patient records from more than 250 participating hospitals. According to one analysis, hospitals nationally could save 70,000 lives per year and cut costs by more than $4.5 billion annually if they made the same improvements as the participating hospitals over a three-year period.

To find out more about the analysis:
- read this Modern Healthcare article (reg. req.)

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