Montana to Test New Health Care Payment Model in January

Governor Steve Bullock was in Missoula on Monday announcing a new coordinated payment system for health care in Montana. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Public Information Officer Mike Fierberg says the program is called Comprehensive Primary Care Plus, and is a five year pilot project being run in Montana and fourteen other locations, starting January 1 of 2017.

"By coordinating the payments to the providers with the quality of care provided and the better outcomes they receive, we think this is going to drive better efficiency," said Fierberg. "This means better health care for Montanans as well as cutting the overall amount of money spent by the tax payers."

Currently, medical professionals are paid for services, sometimes even for unnecessary services. Fierberg says this new system will focus on paying the medical industry based on outcomes.

"What will happen is we will pay the practices that get involved with this program a flat dollar fee per beneficiary per month," Fierberg said. "This will range between 15 and 28 dollars. In exchange, they will have to give us more information about utilization and quality of the outcomes. We will need more data from them."

Practitioners who want to participate in the program only have a few days left to sign up. Insurance companies participating in the trial include Pacific Source, Blue Cross Blue Shield, and Montana Medicaid. The deadline for providers to sign up is this Thursday, September 15th.  Fierberg said Montana is just one of two rural regions (Arkansas is the other) participating in the project. Those interested can call the CMS  help desk at 844 442 2672.