Health Insurance Exchange

By Cara V. James, PhD, Director, CMS Office of Minority Health  Each April we observe National Minority Health Month. This year’s theme is, Bridging Health Equity Across Communities. This theme acknowledges the important role that social determinants of health play in individual and community well-being. It also evokes action and activity  around health equity. For it is not enough for us to simply observe National Minority Health Month and share statistics on long-standing health and health care disparities. We should strive to move the needle by reducing these disparities and improving health care quality and outcomes for all. As this National Minority... Read more »

April 26, 2017 By: Seema Verma, Administrator, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) As many of you know, April is National Minority Health Month, and it’s a privilege to be Administrator at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and take part in the observance. This year’s theme is “Bridging Health Equity Across Communities”. At CMS we have an extraordinary opportunity to improve health outcomes for the over 100 million people that we serve every day. Our primary mission is to make healthcare accessible and affordable for all Americans. During this important month, we continue our efforts to raise awareness about... Read more »

February 27, 2017 By Patrick Conway, M.D., M.Sc., Acting Administrator, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services; Deidre Gifford, M.D., M.P.H., Deputy Director, Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services; Ellen-Marie Whelan, N.P., Ph.D., Chief Population Health Officer, Center for Medicaid and CHIP Services; and Alex Billioux, M.D., D.Phil., Director, Division of Population Health Incentives and Infrastructure, Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation In partnership with states and providers, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) plays a leading role in safeguarding the health of America’s future by providing coverage for more than one in three American children[1]. Through Medicaid and the Children’s... Read more »

If you still need health coverage for 2017, you have until January 31st to sign up for coverage through HealthCare.gov. Through the website you can review your choices and see if you qualify for financial help. Issuers have confirmed that consumers who select a plan and pay their first premium will have coverage for 2017. And, insurers have signed contracts to provide coverage through 2017. Consumers who want coverage – whether you are new to the Health Insurance Marketplace or have previously enrolled in health coverage – can visit HealthCare.gov, update your information, or add it for the first time, and... Read more »

By Niall Brennan, Director of the CMS Office of Enterprise Data and Analytics, and CMS Chief Data Officer; and, Tim Engelhardt, Director of the Federal Coordinated Health Care Office at CMS   Data Brief: Sharp reduction in avoidable hospitalizations among long-term care facility residents For long-term care facility residents, avoidable hospitalizations can be dangerous, disruptive, and disorienting. Keeping our most vulnerable citizens healthy when they are residents of long-term care facilities[1] and reducing potentially avoidable hospital stays has been a point of emphasis for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). Over the last several years, with the help from the Affordable Care... Read more »

By Kate Goodrich, MD Director, CMS Center for Clinical Standards and Quality & CMS Chief Medical Officer Today, I am pleased to announce that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is notifying eligible hospitals and critical access hospitals participating in the Hospital Inpatient Quality Reporting (IQR) and/or the Medicare Electronic Health Record (EHR) Incentive Programs of a deadline extension.  The extension is for the submission of electronic Clinical Quality Measure (eCQM) data for the 2016 reporting period, pertaining to the fiscal year (FY) 2018 payment determination.  The deadline has been changed from Tuesday, February 28, 2017, to Monday, March 13,... Read more »

By    Dr. Patrick Conway, Acting Principal Deputy Administrator and Deputy Administrator          for Innovation & Quality and Pauline Lapin, MHS, Director, Seamless Care Models Group, Center for Medicare &                  Medicaid Innovation Over the past few years, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has committed to supporting clinicians by providing them with actionable data. This is part of the Administration-wide initiative to unlock government data to promote innovation and best practices. Today, we are highlighting one way we have reached this goal and sharing how we plan to use... Read more »

  By Dr. Patrick Conway, Acting Principal Deputy Administrator and Deputy Administrator for Innovation & Quality Transforming Health Care Delivery through the CMS Innovation Center: Better Care, Healthier People, and Smarter Spending We have made great progress in recent years on reforming our system into one that delivers better quality of care for patients and pays for care in a smarter way, including investing more in prevention and primary care. Before 2010, there had been only modest efforts to improve care and reduce costs. Medicare – the country’s largest health care insurance program – was largely paying for health services based on volume –... Read more »

By: Patrick Conway, MD, MSc, CMS Acting Principal Deputy Administrator and Chief Medical Officer and Kate Goodrich, M.D., M.H.S., Director, Center for Clinical Standards & Quality, CMS The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) continues to work diligently to make health care quality information more transparent and understandable for consumers. At CMS, one of our top priorities is to help individuals make informed health care decisions for themselves or their loved ones based on objective measures of quality. The CMS Compare websites are reliable sources of information where individuals can compare the quality of health care providers, facilities, and health... Read more »

By: Kate Goodrich, MD MHS, Director, Center for Clinical Standards and Quality, CMS At the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), we are working with numerous partners to transform our health care delivery system to one that delivers better health outcomes while spending dollars more wisely. In November of 2015, we updated the CMS Quality Strategy, incorporating the ongoing work to shift Medicare from paying for the number of services provided to paying for better outcomes for patients. We know that a key strategy to achieving better outcomes is to meaningfully engage patients as partners in decisions about their health... Read more »