ACO Growth Inches CMS Toward Value-Based Care Goal

Modern Healthcare / By Bridget Early
 
More than half of fee-for-service Medicare enrollees are now in accountable care arrangements, putting the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services past midway toward its 2030 goal, according to data the agency released Wednesday.
Accountable care participation rose 4.3% to 14.8 million people from 2024 to 2025, the largest annual increase since CMS started tracking these numbers. That amounts to 53.4% of fee-for-service beneficiaries, according to the agency.
 
The CMS report illustrates the progress the agency has made promoting value-based care in traditional Medicare since announcing in 2021 that it wanted all fee-for-service enrollees in accountable care arrangements by 2030. It also shows how much is left to do to meet that target, and consummating the endeavor would require President-elect Donald Trump's administration to pick up where President Joe Biden's team leaves off.
 
“This progress demonstrates that when providers are empowered to manage costs and focus on outcomes, they can achieve high-quality outcomes and drive innovation,” Aisha Pittman, senior vice president of government affairs for the National Association of ACOs, said in a news release.
 
Tweaks to existing accountable care organizations and the creation of models such as the ACO Primary Care Flex Model support the 2030 goal, but regression in one high-profile model highlights the ongoing challenges. Congress also must decide how to handle bonus payments for providers transitioning into value-based care.
 
The CMS report covers the permanent Medicare Shared Savings Program and models from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation such as ACO Realizing Equity, Access and Community Health, or ACO REACH…

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Dementia Cases Expected to Double by 2060: Study

The Hill / By Filip Timotija
 
Alzheimer’s disease is expected to spike nationwide in future years, and according to new data released by the Alzheimer’s Association, there is a significant shortage in the dementia care workforce.
 
Dementia cases in the U.S. are expected to double by 2060 when around 1 million Americans are projected to develop the memory-losing condition every year, according to a new study that was published Monday in the medical journal Nature Medicine. 
The study found that the risk of developing dementia after turning age 55 is around 42 percent. Dementia is a group condition that includes loss of concentration, judgment and memory. 
 
The collaborative study was funded by the National Institutes of Health to NYU Langone. It relied on the data garnered from the ongoing Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities Neurocognitive Study, which began in 1987 and has tracked the cognitive function and vascular health of participants. 
 
“Our study results forecast a dramatic rise in the burden from dementia in the United States over the coming decades, with one in two Americans expected to experience cognitive difficulties after age 55,” said Josef Coresh, the study’s senior investigator and epidemiologist. 
 
The researchers discovered that a lifetime risk of suffering from dementia for men after turning 55 is 35 percent while it is 48 percent for women. For the most part, the higher risk among women is because of their lower death rates, according to researchers. 
The study also found those who had a variant of the APOE4 gene are at a higher risk of developing dementia. 
 
Blood pressure control and preventing diabetes are one of the ways to slow down cognitive decline and prevent dementia, according to researchers…

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6 Behaviors You Must Unlearn to be a Relevant Leader in 2025 

Forbes / By Glenn Llopis

Leadership today isn’t what it used to be. Gone are the days when a title or a corner office automatically commanded respect. Today, business leaders need more than authority, they need relevance. But being a relevant leader is not just about adopting new behaviors; it’s about unlearning bad habits. Especially those that do more harm than good. ... Here are six behaviors you must unlearn that once felt relevant and now may be holding you back. I’ve also included the six behaviors you must relearn.

  1. Stop Controlling Everything ...
  2. Transactional Leadership ... "leadership is more than ticking items off a to-do list. Your team needs presence." ...
  3. Always Need to Lead ...
  4. Playing It Safe ...
  5. Separating Work and Emotion ...
  6. Holding On to Bad Habits ...

Being a relevant leader is about being curious, adaptable, and grounded in reality. Leadership is not static. It’s a continuous process discovery plus action…

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Weekly US Map: Influenza Summary Update 

U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

A Weekly Influenza Surveillance Report Prepared by the Influenza Division
utpatient Respiratory Illness Activity Map Determined by Data Reported to ILINet. This system monitors visits for respiratory illness that includes fever plus a cough or sore throat, also referred to as ILI, not laboratory confirmed influenza and may capture patient visits due to other respiratory pathogens that cause similar symptoms. 

https://www.cdc.gov/fluview/surveillance/2025-week-01.html

 

New Minimum Wage Takes Effect in Boulder, Colorado

Littler / By Luke Gilewski, Libby Valenzuela, and Jennifer Harpole

The City of Boulder has enacted its own local minimum wage ordinance, which took effect January 1, 2025, setting the city’s minimum wage at $15.57 per hour. The new law adds another challenge to multi-jurisdiction compliance for employers as the city’s minimum wage is higher than the State of Colorado’s, which increased to $14.81 per hour on January 1, 2025.

Since 2020, Colorado law has allowed local governments to enact their own minimum wages. As a result, communities across Colorado began exploring an increase to their local minimum wage, but to date, only three communities have adopted such laws – Denver, Edgewater, and unincorporated Boulder County.

Since the City of Boulder is located within Boulder County, employers with operations in both the city and the county will need to navigate a situation where employees performing similar work may be subject to different wage rates depending on their specific location on any given day. For comparison, effective January 1, 2025, unincorporated Boulder County – including Niwot, Eldorado Springs, Eldora, Allenspark, Gold Hill, Hygiene, Coal Creek Canyon, and those parts of Gunbarrel that are not part of the City of Boulder – has set its minimum wage at $16.57 per hour or $13.55 per hour with tip credit. The county’s wage will increase by a fixed amount each year until it reaches $25.00 per hour in 2030, before being indexed to inflation thereafter. This dynamic creates an added layer of complexity for employers, who must carefully track employee assignments across these differing localities to ensure compliance with local wage laws.  

The City of Boulder’s ordinance applies to employers with one or more “covered” employees, which are defined under the ordinance as individuals performing, or expected to perform, four or more hours of work for an employer in any given week within the City of Boulder. The ordinance defines “work” as “any services performed physically within the geographic boundaries of the City of Boulder on behalf of or for the benefit of an employer whether on an hourly, piecework, commission, time, task, or other basis.” Excluded from the law are individuals traveling through Boulder’s jurisdiction with no employment-related or commercial stops, individuals providing volunteer services that are uncompensated except for reimbursement for expenses such as meals, parking, or transportation, and independent contractors. Interestingly, the ordinance states that independent contractors are defined by federal – not state – law…

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