The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has awarded $2.1 million to the American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP), Chicago, to develop pathology-related quality measures that will be incorporated into ASCP’s National Pathology Quality Registry (NPQR) for CMS’s quality payment program (QPP).
ASCP is among seven awardees—and the only pathology or laboratory medicine organization—to receive cooperative agreement awards through the “Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA) Funding Opportunity: Measure Development for the Quality Payment Program.”
NPQR is a national quality and benchmarking program that aims to improve patient outcomes by helping laboratories assess and optimize their quality and performance. NPQR captures data that measure adherence to clinical practice guideline recommendations, quality and performance standards, and laboratory testing stewardship. CMS granted the registry qualified clinical data registry status for 2018, meaning that pathologists and laboratories can utilize NPQR to fulfill 2018 quality reporting requirements as a part of CMS’s merit-based incentive payment system (MIPS).
Ali Brown, MD, FASCP, American Society for Clinical Pathology.
The CMS grant will facilitate ASCP’s efforts to demonstrate that pathology is central to the value-based care movement that has become a principal theme in medical practice. With the support of the grant funding, ASCP and its partner, Impaq International LLC, will continue building a pathology-related quality measure portfolio, emphasizing clinical and patient perspectives and minimizing the reporting burden on clinicians. ASCP will provide clinician and patient perspectives and needs related to quality measure development.
“This grant award demonstrates CMS’s focus on providing meaningful measures for pathologists and will allow ASCP to advance a focused, patient-centered quality initiative,” says Ali Brown, MD, FASCP, chief officer for medical quality at ASCP.“We are so honored to receive this award to help us strengthen NPQR and improve pathology practice for our members and our patients.”
The grant also helps CMS to leverage the expertise and insight of those on the front lines of laboratory medicine, to develop measures that make the most sense and contribute to building a truly value-based healthcare system.
For further information, visit the American Society for Clinical Pathology.
