The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Updates Physician Payment Information for Value-Driven Health Care

To support the delivery of high-quality, efficient health care and enable consumers to make more informed health care decisions, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is making cost and quality data available to all Americans. As part of this initiative, Medicare posted information in 2007 and 2008 about the payments it made during the previous year for common and elective procedures and services provided by Hospitals, Ambulatory Surgery Centers (ASCs), Hospital Outpatient Departments, and Physicians.

The Hospital information is posted on the Hospital Compare Website where it can be viewed along with hospital quality information. The Hospital compare website may be found at www.medicare.gov.

On August 28, 2009, Medicare posted an update to the Ambulatory Surgery Center data. The Physician payment data was posted on September 25, 2009. Hospital Outpatient Department data will be updated later this year. The information is being displayed in the same format as in previous years, updated with calendar year (CY) 2008 data. The posting updates may be found at: www.cms.hhs.gov/HealthCareConInit/.