The American Medical Association recently announced it has
signed an agreement with Congress promising to develop 140 standard measures of
performance covering 34 clinical areas by the end of 2006. While this may appear
to be an ambitious task for one year, the AMA-led Consortium for Physician
Quality Improvement had developed 90 measures by the end of 2005. Work is
already underway on 10 new clinical topics, most of which will have multiple
measures. Consortium measures developed to date account for conditions
covering a substantial portion of Medicare spending.The performance measures are
supposed to focus on diagnostic tests and treatments that are known to produce
better outcomes for patients - longer lives, improved quality of life and fewer
complications.
The agreement focuses on the development of a voluntary physician quality
reporting system and cites the need to provide an additional payment update to
physicians who voluntarily report measures in 2007. Congress must enact
legislation before a pay-for-performance system can be put in place. In
addition, the agreement states that the AMA needs to work with Congress during
2006 to develop payment and quality reforms and was signed by Duane M. Cady, MD,
chairman of the American Medical Association, and by three Republican members of
Congress responsible for Medicare legislation: Senator
Charles E. Grassley of Iowa and
Representatives
Bill Thomas of California and Nathan Deal
of Georgia.
In
a separate letter to Congressional leaders, 10 national physicians groups
representing a diverse range of specialties stated: "We are dismayed that an
agreement was reached on issues that are critical to the future of our
specialties and our patients without our participation or knowledge. The
American Medical Association cannot be the sole representative for the groups
who are paramount to the development and implementation of quality measures."
Please log on to the
AAPM&R Web site for periodic updates on this issue at
www.aapmr.org.
|back to top|
