A new survey of health care and policy leaders has found a “vast majority” support “sweeping changes” to Medicare that would help control costs and improve quality, leveraging the program’s status as the U.S. health care system’s largest payer.
The survey, cosponsored by the Commonwealth Fund and Modern Healthcare, found broad support for using Medicare as a testing ground for cost and quality innovations.
A full 95 percent of respondents said they favor expanding the power of the Secretary of Health and Human Services to put payment pilot programs on a “fast track,” and 94 percent favor expanding work with private payers and providers to establish multipayer initiatives.
Three-quarters (75 percent) support creating an independent Medicare advisory council, and most favor giving that council authority to collaborate in multipayer initiatives; develop, test and implement payment reforms rapidly and flexibly; and alter beneficiary incentives based on effectiveness of services, drugs and devices.
Respondents also favored other measures that are still controversial on Capitol Hill but are included in the House health care reform bill. Eighty-one percent favored letting Medicare negotiate drug prices for its beneficiaries, and 79 percent favored filling the “donut hole” through some combination of copayments, government funding, and drug price discounts.
“While these responses confirm that Medicare has been a tremendous success in fulfilling its basic mission, they also indicate that it is important for Medicare to take the lead in developing innovative approaches to improving health system performance,” said Karen Davis, president of The Commonwealth Fund, in a news release.
The survey was conducted online by Harris Interactive between Sept. 9 and Oct. 13 among 1,467 “opinion leaders” in health policy and “innovators” in health care delivery and finance, the two sponsors said. The final sample included 215 respondents from various industries, for a response rate of 16 percent.
The survey is the 20th in a series from The Commonwealth Fund, and the 12th conducted in partnership with Modern Healthcare, an industry magazine. Commentaries on the survey results by former Medicare administrators Bruce Vladeck and Gail Wilensky appear in the Nov. 2 issue of Modern Healthcare and are also available on the Commonwealth Fund Web site, along with a data brief discussing the survey findings.
