As part of its efforts to provide medical coverage for more than 100 million people and keep health care effective and inexpensive for all, CMS established and maintains the Innovation Center to develop improved service delivery and payment models. The CMS Innovation Center ensures that these models operate in full compliance with Section 1115A of the Social Security Act and the Affordable Care Act. The center also played an essential role in the implementation of the Quality Payment Program, an initiative that the US Congress created to replace Medicare’s Sustainable Growth Rate formula with more efficient physician payment modalities.
To promote comprehensive and competent health care payment and delivery operations, the CMS Innovation Center separates its programs into seven distinct categories:
1) Accountable Care
2) Episode-based Payment Initiatives
3) Primary Care Transformation
4) Initiatives Focused on Medicare-Medicaid Enrollees
5) Initiatives Focused on the Medicaid and CHIP Population
6) Initiatives to Accelerate the Development and Testing of New Payment and Service Delivery Models
7) Initiatives to Speed the Adoption of Best Practices.