Accountable Care: What It Means to You ACOs also will encourage more communication to take place between you and your doctor - between your office visits, not just during visits. As such, ACOs put a lot more focus on maintaining health and disease prevention.
Accountable care organizations (ACOs) are expected to be a cornerstone of healthcare reform. They are expected to make healthcare less fragmented, with more streamlined exchange of information.
ACOs are being created across the nation in response to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, or healthcare reform act, which was passed into law in 2010. Pilot projects have shown that the ACO model creates much more connectivity in healthcare by breaking down silos that may exist between different types of healthcare providers, such as primary care doctors, hospitals, nursing homes and rehabilitation centers.
Through an ACO model, Medicare and Medicaid will share financial savings with providers. These savings will be based on:
- enhancing the patient's experience of care, including quality, access and reliability;
- reducing the per capita cost of care; and
- improving the health of a defined population.
The national government has established guidelines and some requirements for ACOs, but is encouraging local and regional healthcare communities to determine the ACO approach that will work most effectively to serve their populations.
A big part of reform involves how doctors and other healthcare providers are paid for their services. Reform efforts call for payment to be directly linked to measured quality and efficiency. ACOs may provide the framework for these new payment models.
