Meaningful use
Description
In 2017, the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) implemented its Quality Payment Program as a means to reimburse clinicians on the basis of clinical quality rather than solely on the quantity of provided health services. This policy replaces the previous payment models with a value-based purchasing model to incentivize more patient-centered and efficient healthcare amongst clinicians. Defining and measuring health provider “quality” remains ambiguous. My research empirically examines the link between patient-reported quality measures and technical quality measures in the program. Specifically, I use a regression analysis with fixed effects to study the two quality ratings from the Merit-based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) in outpatient settings. I find that the correlation between the quality rating scores is statistically significant (p < 0.001), but the association is weak (the technical quality score accounts for 0.004% of the total magnitude of the patient-rating score). Existing literature supports these findings and concludes that each score plays a unique role in capturing the clinician’s “true” quality. Findings of this research could inform whether or not patients value care apart from what is clinically appropriate.