An article in Oncology Times said as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services continues its transitions towards regulating value-based reimbursement, physicians that serve disadvantaged populations could be underpaid.
Here are four thoughts:
1. According to a report from a committee of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, providers who serve disadvantaged populations are limited in resources and serve a population that requires large amounts of resources. Because of that, they could fare poorly on CMS quality ratings, which could increase the level of healthcare disparity in the United States.
2. The unintended increase in disparities caused by value-based Medicare payments could pose a special problem in the field of oncology. Cancer tends to be discovered in disadvantaged populations in its late stages, and often these patients have short survival rates.
3. Professor at the Center for Health Services and Outcomes Research at John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Donald Steinwachs said accounting for social risk factors in Medicare payments is intended to bring social disparities to light, not obscure them. He believes the payment system has to include "sufficient incentives for quality improvement for both socially at-risk populations and to patients overall."
4. If the new value-based reimbursement model takes social risk factors into ample account, the authors believe health disparities could decrease, but they referred to that as the best case scenario. Safeguarding patients' rights and assuring patients equal access to care is going to be critical when treating disadvantaged patient populations.
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