Primary care has money problems. A five-year ‘prospective payment’ system might help

Medical Xpress February 19, 2025
Alvin Powell, Harvard Gazette

Many health experts say that U.S. primary care is in crisis, with demand for appointments rising and doctors scarce. A new five-year experiment might prove part of the solution.

Set in motion by Affordable Care Act provisions intended to boost financing innovations, the program, ACO PC Flex, will increase primary care spending while incentivizing doctors to use the funds to head off serious illness and expensive hospital visits. The goal, proponents say, is a healthy cycle of better, broader primary care options.

Soleil Shah, a policy researcher and physician at Harvard-affiliated Brigham and Women’s Hospital, co-authored a recent opinion piece on the new initiative in the Journal of the American Medical Association. In this edited conversation with the Gazette, Shah...

Today's Sponsors

Today's Sponsor