Medicare Physician Payment Rates: Better Data and Greater Transparency Could Improve Accuracy
Highlights
What GAO Found
The American Medical Association/Specialty Society Relative Value Scale Update Committee (RUC) has a process in place to regularly review Medicare physicians' services' work relative values (which reflect the time and intensity needed to perform a service). Its recommendations to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), the agency within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) that administers Medicare, though, may not be accurate due to process and data-related weaknesses. First, the RUC's process for developing relative value recommendations relies on the input of physicians who may have potential conflicts of interest with respect to the outcomes of CMS's process. While the RUC has taken steps to mitigate the impact of physicians' potential conflicts of interest, a member of the RUC told GAO that specialty societies' work relative value recommendations may still be inflated. RUC staff indicated that the RUC may recommend a work relative value to CMS that is less than the specialty societies' median survey result if the value seems accurate based on the RUC members' clinical expertise or by comparing the value to those of related services. Second, GAO found weaknesses with the RUC's survey data, including that some of the RUC's survey data had low response rates, low total number of responses, and large ranges in responses, all of which may undermine the accuracy of the RUC's recommendations. For example, while GAO found that the median number of responses to surveys for payment year 2015 was 52, the median response rate was only 2.2 percent, and 23 of the 231 surveys had under 30 respondents.
CMS's process for establishing relative values embodies several elements that cast doubt on whether it can ensure accurate Medicare payment rates and a transparent process. First, although CMS officials stated that CMS complies with the statutory requirement to review all Medicare services every 5 years, the agency does not maintain a database to track when a service was last valued or have a documented standardized process for prioritizing its reviews. Second, CMS's process is not fully transparent because the agency does not publish the potentially misvalued services identified by the RUC in its rulemaking or otherwise, and thus stakeholders are unaware that these services will be reviewed and payment rates for these services may change. Third, CMS provides some information about its process in its rulemaking, but does not document the methods used to review specific RUC recommendations. For example, CMS does not document what resources were considered during its review of the RUC's recommendations for specific services. Finally, the evidence suggests—and CMS officials acknowledge—that the agency relies heavily on RUC recommendations when establishing relative values. For example, GAO found that, in the majority of cases, CMS accepts the RUC's recommendations and participation by other stakeholders is limited. Given the process and data-related weaknesses associated with the RUC's recommendations, such heavy reliance on the RUC could result in inaccurate Medicare payment rates. CMS has begun to research ways to develop an approach for validating RUC recommendations, but does not yet have a specific plan for doing so. In addition, CMS does not yet have a plan for how it will use funds Congress appropriated for the collection and use of data on physicians' services or address the other data challenges GAO identified.
Why GAO Did This Study
Payments for Medicare physicians' services totaled about $70 billion in 2013. CMS sets payment rates for about 7,000 physicians' services primarily on the basis of the relative values assigned to each service. Relative values largely reflect estimates of the physician work and practice expenses needed to provide one service relative to other services.
The Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014 included a provision for GAO to study the RUC's process for developing relative value recommendations for CMS. GAO evaluated (1) the RUC's process for recommending relative values for CMS to consider when setting Medicare payment rates; and (2) CMS's process for establishing relative values, including how it uses RUC recommendations. GAO reviewed RUC and CMS documents and applicable statutes and internal control standards, analyzed RUC and CMS data for payment years 2011 through 2015, and interviewed RUC staff and CMS officials.
Recommendations
CMS should better document its process for establishing relative values and develop a process to inform the public of potentially misvalued services identified by the RUC. CMS should also develop a plan for using funds appropriated for the collection and use of information on physicians' services in the determination of relative values. HHS agreed with two of GAO's recommendations, but disagreed with using rulemaking to inform the public of RUC-identified services. GAO clarified that the recommendation is not limited to rulemaking.
Recommendations for Executive Action
| Agency Affected | Recommendation | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services | To help improve CMS's process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services, the Administrator of CMS should better document the process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services, including the methods used to review RUC recommendations and the rationale for final relative value decisions. |
To help improve the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service's (CMS) process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services, in May 2015 we recommended that the Administrator of CMS better document the process, including the methods used to review recommendations from the American Medical Association/Specialty Society Relative Value Scale Update Committee (RUC) and the rationale for final relative value decisions. CMS concurred with this recommendation, stating that CMS establishes relative values for new, revised, and potentially misvalued physicians' services based on its review of a variety of sources of information, including the RUC. At that time, CMS officials told us the agency was working to improve the transparency of its process by proposing and finalizing changes to the process in the annual rule for the Physician Fee Schedule. Officials estimated that this process would take several years to complete. In order to close this recommendation as implemented, CMS will need to demonstrate that it has improved its internal and external documentation of its process for establishing relative values. As of February 2024, GAO was still waiting on confirmation from CMS that it had completed its enhancement process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services in a way that would allow for greater transparency and documentation. CMS will need to demonstrate that it has improved its internal and external documentation for establishing relative values in order for GAO to close the recommendation. CMS officials agreed the recommendation should remain open as progress continues.
|
| Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services | To help improve CMS's process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services, the Administrator of CMS should develop a process for informing the public of potentially misvalued services identified by the RUC, as CMS already does for potentially misvalued services identified by CMS or other stakeholders. |
To help improve the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service's (CMS) process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services, in May 2015 we recommended that the Administrator of CMS develop a process for informing the public of potentially misvalued services identified by the American Medical Association/Specialty Society Relative Value Scale Update Committee (RUC), as CMS already does for potentially misvalued services identified by CMS or other stakeholders. CMS did not concur with this recommendation, asserting that the RUC is completely independent of CMS, and as such CMS has no authority to set the RUC's agenda for which services are reviewed. As of February 2024, CMS had not changed its position on the recommendation. We continue to believe that CMS needs to inform the public of potentially misvalued services identified by the RUC, as it does for potentially misvalued services identified by other stakeholders. We acknowledge that in 2017 CMS changed its process for establishing relative values by including proposed values for almost all services in the annual proposed rulemaking for the Physician Fee Schedule, which means that the changes in values for potentially misvalued services identified by the RUC are open for public comment before they become effective. However, we continue to believe CMS should inform stakeholders of these potentially misvalued services before CMS receives RUC recommendations for them and subsequently publishes the values in the proposed rule. Doing so would give stakeholders the same amount of time they have to provide input on potentially misvalued services identified by other stakeholders.
|
| Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services | To help improve CMS's process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services, the Administrator of CMS should incorporate data and expertise from physicians and other relevant stakeholders into the process as well as develop a timeline and plan for using the funds appropriated by the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014. |
To help improve the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service's (CMS) process for establishing relative values for Medicare physicians' services, in May 2015 we recommended that the Administrator of CMS incorporate data and expertise from physicians and other relevant stakeholders into the process, as well as develop a timeline and plan for using the funds appropriated by the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014 (PAMA). CMS concurred with this recommendation, stating that stakeholders have the opportunity each year to nominate potentially misvalued services for review through a public nomination process. In August 2017, CMS officials provided a copy of the final rulemaking for the 2017 Physician Fee Schedule, which described a data collection effort using PAMA funds and other authorities that will help furnish data to help in valuations for more than half of physician services. However, this effort pertains to global services, which are a specific type of service under the Physician Fee Schedule that include global, professional, and technical components, and does not apply to non-global services, which encompass almost half of physician services. Officials also reported that they had awarded a contract to explore data collection on practice expense and methodologies for using such data when valuing services in the Physician Fee Schedule. However, CMS did not indicate a specific timeline and plan for using the PAMA funds, just that the agency would continue to use these funds to explore more ways to gain improved data. We acknowledge that CMS has made progress towards meeting our recommendation by beginning to use PAMA funds to assist with valuing global services and exploring avenues for collecting practice expense data. To close this recommendation, we need documentation that CMS has started to incorporate data more broadly into its process for establishing relative values and that it has a documented timeline and plan for how it will use the funds appropriated by the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014. As of February 2024, we had not received this documentation.
|