Medicare Cost-Cutting Demo Programs Fall Short In Cutting Spending

These findings from the Congressional Budget Office, based on 20 years of efforts to shift the program, are a blow to ongoing Medicare projects as well as a key component of the health law.  

The Hill: CBO: Medicare Cost-Cutting Programs Haven't Worked
Programs designed to cut Medicare spending and improve the quality of healthcare have mostly failed, according to the Congressional Budget Office. The findings are a blow to existing Medicare projects as well as a key goal of the healthcare reform law. There is widespread support, in Congress and among economists, for the broad ideal that Medicare would save money if it paid for better outcomes instead of more procedures. But 20 years of trying to shift the program in that direction have yielded little to no progress, CBO said Wednesday (Baker, 1/18).

Modern Healthcare: CBO Finds Demo Projects Have Little Impact On Medicare Spending
A new analysis from the Congressional Budget Office revealed that most demonstration projects in two separate categories—disease management/care coordination and value-based payment—have not reduced spending in the Medicare program. Researchers at the non-partisan CBO examined the results of 10 major demonstrations, including six in disease management/care coordination and four in value-based payment. In almost every instance, the findings showed, spending was either unchanged or increased relative to the spending that would have occurred without the program, when the fees paid to the participating organizations were taken into account (Zigmond, 1/18).

Politico Pro: CBO Care Coordination Report Holds Lessons
The Congressional Budget Office has some somber words of warning to health care reformers who anticipate easy savings through care coordination, disease management or value-based purchasing: Good ideas on paper don't always generate hoped-for savings in the real world of health care. In an issue brief published Wednesday, CBO reviewed the literature on 10 Medicare demonstrations — reviewing the data on six disease management and care coordination demonstrations and four value-based payment demos over the last decade. Most of the care management approaches didn't achieve the desired outcomes in care quality and savings (Kenen, 1/18).