Pros and Cons of the Accountable Care Organization Model

The current issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings contains a collection of commentaries from six leading health care organizations explaining why they did or did not choose to participate in the CMS ACO program. For example, representatives from St. Louis-based SSM Health Care cited lack of beneficiary engagement as a serious design flaw and a reason not to participate. In contrast, two of Ascension Health's sites in Texas chose to participate to gain experience in medical management and financial risk management, as well as to identify novel strategies for engaging physicians around shared values and shared business objectives. The commentary authors write not only about ACOs but, more broadly, about the challenges of reducing health care costs while improving health care quality.