In modifications to its Medicare Advantage Value-Based Insurance Design model, CMS is introducing four new approaches for targeted interventions for certain clinical conditions. One of the approaches will allow providers to use telehealth services.
The MA-VBID model is a way for Medicare Advantage plans to offer clinically focused benefit packages to help improve care quality while reducing costs, largely by encouraging enrollees to use "high-value clinical services" that are most likely to positively affect their health. The first year of the model is scheduled to begin in 2017, and the second in 2018.
The model, according to Politico, "frees plans to handle their complex patients differently — perhaps by reducing co-pays or other benefit tweaks to steer patients toward better care."
Plans participating in the new model may select plan design modifications from a menu of four approaches. One of those approaches includes adding coverage for supplemental benefits for certain populations, such as video consultations with audio and video technologies for diabetics.
The second year of the model, which includes these changes, is open to new applicants and will test the model in Alabama, Michigan and Texas.
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