Creating High-Quality Results and Outcomes Necessary to Improve Chronic (CHRONIC) Care Act of 2017

Creating High-Quality Results and Outcomes Necessary to Improve Chronic (CHRONIC) Care Act of 2017

This bill amends title XVIII (Medicare) of the Social Security Act to:

• extend the Independence at Home demonstration program;
• modify provisions regarding access to home dialysis therapy under Medicare and special needs plans under Medicare Advantage (MA);
• expand testing of the MA Value-Based Insurance Design test model;
• allow an MA plan to provide additional telehealth benefits to enrollees and, to chronically ill enrollees, certain supplemental health care benefits;
• modify other provisions regarding the use of telehealth services;
• allow prospective, voluntary assignment of Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries to accountable care organizations (ACOs);
• allow ACOs to operate beneficiary incentive programs;
• require the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to establish a process for Medicare prescription-drug plan sponsors to request certain claims data from the CMS;
• require the CMS to study and report to Congress on long-term risk factors for chronic conditions among Medicare beneficiaries; and
• eliminate annual funding available to the Medicare Improvement Fund and the Medicaid Improvement Fund beginning in FY2021.

The Government Accountability Office shall conduct studies on:

• the establishment of a payment code for a visit for longitudinal comprehensive care planning services,
• the extent to which Medicare prescription drug plans and private payors use programs that synchronize pharmacy dispensing to facilitate comprehensive counseling and promote medication adherence, and
• the use of prescription drugs to manage the weight of obese patients and the impact of such drug coverage on patient health and health care spending.

Written by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service. All summary versions on Congress.gov