Dive Brief:

• CMS proposed a rule that it says would save healthcare providers an estimated $1.12 billion annually by removing "unnecessary, obsolete or excessively burdensome Medicare compliance requirements." Multi-hospital systems, critical access hospitals, ambulatory surgical centers, transplant centers, outpatient rehabilitative facilities and x-ray services are among those that would be impacted by the rule. 
• If finalized, the rule would remove the requirement that ambulatory surgical centers have a written transfer agreement with a hospital or that the center's physicians have admitting privileges at a nearby hospital. CMS said that provision was at the behest of the ASC trade association "to address the widespread issue of the growing number of hospitals that are declining to work with ASCs."
• The proposed rule would also remove duplicative ownership disclosure requirements for critical access hospitals and allow multi-hospital systems to have integrated quality assessment, performance improvement and infection control programs for all member hospitals.

Dive Insight:

Removing regulatory burdens and offering providers more choices are some of the Trump administration's healthcare goals, and CMS is well aware of problems with reporting data.  

The agency has spent much of 2017 and 2018 acting on its promises to alleviate reporting burdens, cutting requirements here and there with seemingly every new rule proposal.

Taking CMS' previous reporting requirement measures from 2017 and 2018 into account, the proposal estimates savings of $5.2 billion between 2018 and 2021. Additionally, CMS projects a reduction of 53 million hours of reporting burden through 2021. 

The agency has compiled feedback from providers and categorized that feedback into 1,146 issues. CMS says it has taken action to address 55% of those issues to date, while 16% remain under consideration and 29% have either been referred to another agency or don't require further action. 

Included in the proposal are rules that would reduce requirements for transplant centers that force them to re-submit materials for Medicare approval and simplify the ordering process for portable X-rays. 

"The changes we're proposing will dramatically reduce the amount of time and resources that healthcare facilities have to spend on CMS-mandated compliance activities that do not improve the quality of care, so that hospitals and healthcare professionals can focus on their primary mission: treating patients," ​Seema Verma, CMS administrator, said in a statement.

For clinicians, less reporting requirements is music to the ears. In a 2017 Medical Group Management Association survey, nearly half of group practices said they spend more than $40,000 per full-time physician per year to comply with federal regulations. A similar Health Affairs study found 81% of practices feel more of their effort is spent dealing with quality measures now than just three years ago.  

Last year, CMS asked clinicians to take part in a year-long study looking into the burden of reporting data for MIPS and has been looking to overhaul MACRA and remove reporting barriers for quality measures.