Medicare Accountable Care Spending Patterns: Shifting Expenditures Associated With Savings

The Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP) seeks to improve care quality while reducing unnecessary costs in traditional Medicare fee-for-service by adopting an accountable care organization (ACO) model. MSSP participants receive additional Medicare payments for delivering care below an established benchmark price and for meeting certain population-focused quality measures. As of early 2018, CMS reported 561 MSSP ACOs covering 10.5 million lives, making it the largest of Medicare’s ACO programs.¹ This paper examined whether, in their first 4 years, MSSP ACOs have changed spending patterns and if these changes are related to ACO savings.

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