Slavitt: CMS committed to administrative simplification

Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Acting Administrator Andy Slavitt today told AHA members that the agency is committed to administrative simplification, including improving Medicare’s Recovery Audit Contractor program and aligning Medicare, Medicaid and commercial health insurance programs. “We want to give you back more time to spend with patients,” he said, noting that health care consumers “are active shoppers and unaffordable care is a deal breaker.” Addressing the AHA annual meeting, Slavitt said the agency wants to move the RAC program “from gotcha to education” and focus on “quality, not finding mistakes.” He called the implementation of the 2015 Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act the “next transformative step in health care,” and said the recently proposed MACRA rules are intended to “create on-ramps and off-ramps” that will allow physicians to more easily enter and exit payment reform programs.