According to a new Brief from the Commonwealth Fund, each year more than 40 percent of Medicare beneficiaries discharged from hospitals receive post-acute care services in the form of rehabilitation, skilled nursing, and home health care. Accountable care organizations (ACO), which coordinate their patients’ treatment across all care settings, could play a key role in ensuring these services are appropriately used, but little is known, however, about the extent to which they engage post-acute care providers in managing outcomes and costs.
The Brief can be accessed at http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/in-brief/2016/apr/accountability-across-continuum-postacute-care-acos.