Saying the Right Thing

The head person (Administrator) of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) is saying the right things.  Her name is Seema Verma and here are some of her comments:

  • “I’d like to think of regulatory reform in terms of painting a house.  Typically, repainting needs to occur every few years, and before you do it, you need to strip the layers of paint underneath. Unfortunately, during past administrations CMS has been simply applying new layers of paint without taking this essential step.”
  • Verma announced the launch of a “Patients over Paperwork” initiative, geared towards scrapping or reducing regulations while lowering healthcare costs and enhancing patient care.
  • “Regulations do have their role. They’re very important to assuring patient safety and quality and for program integrity, but there’s a fine line between being helpful and being a hindrance”.
  • Over the last 5 years, the agency has released about 58 rules per year — the equivalent of 11,000 published manuscript pages, Verma continued.
  • She also highlighted providers’ frustration with reporting metrics into the electronic health records (EHR), asserting that currently, “the burden associated with reporting quality measures outweighs their utility.”

I like this.  Now let’s see some action because talk means nothing to me.  For example, in the article I linked above there were quotes/recommendations by the head of the American Hospital Association and the AAFP.  Both of which made me throw up in my mouth a little.

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