ABSTRACT
ACOs are designed to increase healthcare quality while decreasing cost. To support an increase in the quality, in contrast to the quantity, of services provided within an ACO, physicians will receive financial bonuses for meeting resource use and quality targets over the course of a year, and penalties for failing to meet these requirements.2 These financial incentives must be substantial enough to overcome the reimbursement yield that physicians obtain from existing models that encourage a high volume of services, e.g., the fee-for-service (FFS) reimbursement system utilized by Medicare, in order to achieve a decrease in the growth of Medicare spending.
