The Western North Carolina Pediatric Collaborative is not an accountable care organization, but the Collaborative’s story serves as an example of how an ACO could develop organically when a group of doctors and community health providers come together to reap the benefits of collaboration and accountability to their patients and their community. “This process and […]

The Looming Threat of Liability for Accountable Care Organizations and What to Do About It, 6-17-13, JAMA H. Benjamin Harvey, MD, JD and I. Glenn Cohen, JD explore the liability risks that are coming to light with the emergence of accountable care organizations. Since ACOs are not covered under ERISA, the authors note that poor outcomes in patients […]

Guess what? Physician-driven accountable care organizations (“ACOs”) are working. The even better news is that this trend is predictable and inevitable. ACOs Are Working – As other materials from the Toward Accountable Care Consortium detail, there are eight fairly straightforward elements required to create a successfuland sustainable ACO: (1) a change in financial incentives from […]

With the spending part of the “fiscal cliff” taxation/spending discussion looming, Congress is finally being forced to confront the main drivers of our deficit dilemma: government “entitlement” programs such as Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. Meanwhile, there is broad consensus that many of our runaway health care costs are avoidable. Our current fee-for-service health care […]

“The most significant challenge of becoming accountable is not forming an organization, it is forging one.” ~ Phillip I. Roning i I. Introduction Due to the unsustainable costs of health care, the movement toward accountable care with value based reimbursement is inevitable. There is a window of opportunity for the physician community to control its […]

Focusing on the future of medicine, including practice models and research, numerous representatives of existing or aspiring NC-based ACOs participated in the second quarterly meeting of the NC ACO Collaborative held on Thursday, June 6, 2013, at Cornerstone Health Care in High Point. The Collaborative is part of the Toward Accountable Care (TAC) Consortium and […]

Cornerstone is recognized as perhaps the most fully developed example of accountable care in the state at this time. With 367 providers, Cornerstone is one of the fastest growing physician groups in the southeast. It is a physician-owned and led multi-disciplinary practice with over 85 locations in communities throughout central North Carolina. Dr. Grace Terrell, […]

It’s not easy becoming an Accountable Care Organization (ACO), but at least one fledgling North Carolina ACO, believed “it was the right thing to do for our patients.” When Coastal Carolina Health Care, P.A. (CCHC) in New Bern was considering forming an ACO, they thought, “should we do it now, or wait? There was a […]

The Physicians Accountable Care Toolkit, developed by the Toward Accountable Care (TAC) Consortium and written by Julian ‘Bo’ Bobbitt of the Smith Anderson law firm, has been added to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Innovations Exchange website as a resource for others nationwide to access. AHRQ is an agency of the US Department of […]

Perhaps the core idea behind emerging models of care like accountable care organizations (ACOs) and projects like Community Care of North Carolina’s Child Health Accountable Care Collaborative (CHACC) is an old concept – build relationships. ACO models are about preserving the sacred doctor-patient relationship, and they are about breaking down the silos and building meaningful […]