Three Outstanding Questions About CMS’s Ambitious New AHEAD Mode
Health Affairs September 14, 2023
In its effort to move the American health care system away from its corrosive fee for service foundation toward a more efficient focus on population health management and total cost of care, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in early September announced one of its most ambitious and wide-ranging demonstration projects, the States Advancing All-Payer Health Equity Approaches and Development (AHEAD) Model. As with other demonstrations, states will volunteer to participate, applying in the Spring of 2024. Given its sweep, CMS intends to run the program through 2034, with careful annual evaluations. States will be able to access up to $12 million in federal dollars to undertake planning.
The goals of the program are familiar, shared by many other...