Baucus, Grassley unveil payment reform 'options'

Senators Max Baucus and Charles Grassley, the ranking Democrat and Republican, respectively, on the Senate Finance Committee, released yesterday a set of “policy options” for improving health quality and controlling costs (Source: “First in wave of healthcare policy proposals debuts,” Boston Globe, April 28, 2009).

The report, titled “Transforming the Health Care Delivery System: Proposals to Improve Patient Care and Reduce Health Care Costs,” (pdf, 52 pages) is the first of an anticipated three sets of options
Grassley and Baucus plan to release.
Among the major themes in the report are:

• Reforming Medicare payments to reward quality of care
• Providing bonuses for primary care physicians and general surgeons
• Establishing quality performance measures and a national quality improvement plan
• Reducing Medicare fraud
• Making a stronger commitment to comparative effectiveness research