Dive Brief:
- A quarter of respondents in a recent EY Health survey of healthcare executives said they have no value-based reimbursement initiatives planned for 2017, although nearly all said they are undertaking some type of cost control measure.
- The most popular initiatives involve reducing medical errors and increasing reliability, and decreasing unnecessary variation and use, while the most planned measure is peer and competitive benchmarking.
- Smaller organizations were least likely to report using value-based reimbursement initiatives.
Dive Insight:
While the question of how valuable value-based care really is remains unanswered, it is clear the industry continues to move away from fee-for-service payments and is focusing on rewarding good care. Some key obstacles are still in the way, however, and the EY survey shows that not all hospitals are ready to pursue value-based initiatives.
The authors of an accompanying report point to four major barriers for value-based payment reform: escalating cost of care delivery; clinical workforce challenges that increase the potential exposure of patients to medical errors; a lack of standardization in how quality is defined and measured; and a lack of trust between providers, payers and regulators.
EY surveyed 700 healthcare professionals, including chief medical officers and chief financial officers, in February and March of this month.
Report author Dr. Yele Aluko, an executive director in the Advisory Health practice at EY, said smaller practices are slower to adopt value-based initiatives often because they don’t have the necessary strategic management processes and corporate resources.
“This creates a competitive disadvantage for smaller hospitals, and quite frankly, puts their financial futures, sustainability and corporate existence in jeopardy,” he wrote. “The new world order in healthcare will require clinical, administrative and financial innovation to meet the needs of consumerism and industry demands for value transparency.”
This only adds to other struggles small and rural hospitals have, such as low patient volumes and difficulty recruiting qualified staff.
Hospital executives will continue to look for the best ways to transition to value-based care, but the survey shows that the road ahead is far from smooth.