By Staff Reporters
***
***
Paying paying doctors and medical providers for their services may seem simple on the surface, but it’s actually extremely complex. Enter two of the most commonly heard phrases in healthcare: “fee-for-service” and “value-based care,” two models insurers use to decide how much to pay providers. According to Healthcare Brew:
- Under a fee-for-service model, providers are paid for each individual service they perform, like a blood test or an X-ray, according to Jennifer Clawson, partner and director of value-based health systems at Boston Consulting Group. A service is provided, and the doctor gets a fixed fee for providing it. Simple enough.
- The value-based care model is a bit more complicated, as there are many types of value-based payments. What makes them “value-based” is that payers take patient outcomes into consideration, aka they consider the relative value. “The core of value-based care is ultimately, ‘How do I get a better outcome for less money?’” said Sam Hendler, managing director at private equity firm Thomas H. Lee Partners.
One type of value-based payment is called a bundled payment, Clawson said. Say you have a heart condition and need to get a stent put in. There are usually several providers involved in that process, e.g., a primary care doctor, cardiac surgeon, and anesthesiologist. An insurer gives the health system a set amount of money to cover everyone involved in the procedure, and the health system decides how to divvy it up.
Another type of value-based payment is called capitation, and there’s multiple types of capitation payments. It’s sort of like a bundled payment, but instead of insurers paying a set amount per procedure, they’re paying a set amount to cover an entire population of patients with a specific disease, like diabetes.
CITE: https://www.r2library.com/Resource/Title/082610254
COMMENTS APPRECIATED
Thank You
****
Filed under: "Doctors Only", Accounting, Career Development, Funding Basics, Glossary Terms, Health Economics, Managed Care | Tagged: Financial Compensation, physician payments, PHYSICIAN PAYMENTS: The Financial Compensation Battle Continues |
Leave a Reply