Hospital Quality Initiative

UPDATE! Important Note to Hospital VBP Final Rule Readers (4-29-11)

Please note that in the Hospital Value-Based Purchasing Program Final Rule displayed at the Federal Register on April 29, 2011 (and published on May 6, 2011), Section II. A. and B. listed on the Table of Contents appear together under the heading of Section II. A. Section II. B. should be titled “Performance Period” and the subsequent section headings should be re-lettered through L.

CMS plans to make formal corrections to this effect; however, in the meantime please read the document, "Important Note to Readers of the HVBP Final Rule," in the Downloads section of this page, for for more clarification.

Hospital Value-based Purchasing Program

The Hospital Value-based Purchasing Program, applies beginning in FY 2013 to payments for discharges occurring on or after October 1, 2012.

Under the Program, CMS will make value-based incentive payments to acute care hospitals, based either on how well the hospitals perform on certain quality measures or how much the hospitals' performance improves on certain quality measures from their performance during a baseline period. The higher a hospital's performance or improvement during the performance period for a fiscal year, the higher the hospital's value-based incentive payment for the fiscal year would be.

As CMS works to implement the Program, we will add more details and pages to this site to help hospitals, patients, and other quality stakeholders navigate and take full advantage of the program's possibilities.

The proposed and final rules are available for reading at the “Related Links Outside CMS” section, below.

Additional information about the Hospital VBP policy is also included in the “Downloads” section, below.