Achieving Better Care at Lower Costs through Accountable Care Organizations

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act created the Medicare Shared Savings program to implement Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs), coordinated networks of providers with shared responsibility for providing better care at lower costs. Officials at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) are currently working on regulations for implementing ACOs in 2012 under Medicare provisions that will help transform the payment and delivery of health care.

On February 1, the Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform and the Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy & Clinical Practice hosted a public forum to discuss the most effective and thoughtful path forward for ACOs to achieve such transformation. Donald Berwick, CMS Administrator, gave a keynote address.

After each panel, speakers took audience questions.