AAOS Registry Program Partners with CMS on Bundled Payment Model

ROSEMONT, Ill. (October 8, 2020)—The American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS) Registry Program is pleased to announce its partnership with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on its Model Year 4 Bundled Payments for Care Improvement (BPCI) Advanced program. Beginning January 1, 2021, the agency will utilize AAOS registry-reported data as part of its new Alternate Quality Measures Set—demonstrating a shared interest in promoting value-based care and ensuring that payment models for musculoskeletal care can better guide decision-making.

“Since 2017, the AAOS has been committed to helping members thrive in value-based environments with a central family of orthopaedic registries,” said Dr. William J. Maloney, MD, FAAOS, chair of the Registry Oversight Committee. “The opportunity to serve as a conduit to CMS helps us do just that by reducing the reporting burden for participating sites, all while ensuring that quality measures are not only accurate but meaningful. We now have a unique opportunity to lead this process as the only musculoskeletal registry program affiliated with BPCI’s Advanced Program and ultimately advance the quality of patient care.”

In August, CMS released quality measure sets for Model Year 4 of the Bundled Payments for Care Improvement (BPCI) Advanced program. BPCI Advanced qualifies as an Advanced Alternative Payment Model under the Quality Payment Program. Under the program, participants can continue to report the Administrative Quality Measures Set or a new Alternate Quality Measures Set, which consists of claims-calculated measures and clinical registry-calculated measures.

CMS worked with AAOS registries to identify measures that align with each of the specialty areas and approved reporting options using the new Alternative Quality Measure Set. The registry programs include The American Joint Replacement Registry (AJRR), the world’s largest national registry of hip and knee joint replacement data by annual procedural count with more than 2 million procedures contained within its database, the Shoulder & Elbow Registry, the Musculoskeletal Tumor Registry, and the American Spine Registry, a collaborative effort between the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) and the AAOS. 

Registry participants will have the opportunity later this fall to amend their participant agreements with CMS for each clinical episode to reflect their choice of measure set. Participants must select either Administrative or Alternate Quality Measures Set for each clinical episode; however, they are not required to select the same Quality Measure Set across all clinical episodes. Current BPCI Advanced participants will receive further information from the agency regarding deadlines for episode and measure set selection through their BPCI Participant Portal, CMMI Connect.

Additional information about the BPCI’s Alternate Quality Measures Set, including frequently asked questions, is available on CMS.gov and on the www.aaos.org/registries. To get involved with an AAOS Registry, email an AAOS Registry engagement associate at registryengagement@aaos.org.

AAOS Registry Program
The AAOS Registry Program’s mission is to improve orthopaedic care through the collection, analysis, and reporting of actionable data. The American Joint Replacement Registry (AJRR), the Academy’s hip and knee replacement registry, is the cornerstone of the AAOS’s Registry Program, and the world’s largest national registry of hip and knee joint replacement data by annual procedural count, with more than 2.1 million procedures contained within its database. Additional registries include the Shoulder & Elbow Registry (SER), the Musculoskeletal Tumor Registry (MsTR), and the American Spine Registry (ASR), a collaborative effort between the American Association of Neurological Surgeons (AANS) and the AAOS. The Fracture & Trauma Registry will open to full enrollment in spring 2021.

About the AAOS
With more than 39,000 members, the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons is the world’s largest medical association of musculoskeletal specialists. The AAOS is the trusted leader in advancing musculoskeletal health. It provides the highest quality, most comprehensive education to help orthopaedic surgeons and allied health professionals at every career level best treat patients in their daily practices. The AAOS is the source for information on bone and joint conditions, treatments and related musculoskeletal health care issues, and it leads the health care discussion on advancing quality.

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