Medicare's bundled payments program did not lead to negative clinical outcomes, or change who hospitals selected as patients, a study published in the November issue of Health Affairs found.
The Bundled Payments for Care Improvement Advanced Model is an optional program where participating hospitals are held accountable for 90-day windows of care. Initiated in 2018, the program reduced overall Medicare payments in 90-day windows, and patients had similar outcomes to those at hospitals that did not participate in the program, the study's authors wrote.
The program's model raised concerns that hospitals would need to attract less-sick patients to meet the spending goals. The study's authors, researchers at Washington University in St. Louis and Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass., compared patients and clinical outcomes at hospitals participating in the model with those not participating.
In the comparison, the researchers did not find evidence of negative impacts among Medicare beneficiaries considered frail, who had multiple morbidities or those dually-enrolled in Medicare and Medicaid.
The analysis also did not find increases in readmission or mortality rates for high-risk groups at hospitals participating in the programs.
"These findings suggest that programs that explicitly incentivize clinicians to develop interventions for high-risk populations may have the potential for improving outcomes and reducing costs of care," the authors wrote.
Read the full study here.