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Quality of Care

Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) seek to provide safe, effective, efficient, patient-centered, high quality and equitable care to all enrollees.  To achieve these goals, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) partners with states to share best practices and to provide technical assistance to improve the quality of care.  

Quality Initiatives

CMS has initiatives to improve the quality of care provided to Medicaid and CHIP enrollees in the following areas:

EPSDT
Dental Care
Obesity
Maternal & Child Health
Home and Community-Based Services
Vaccines

Performance Measurement
Health Disparities
Patient Safety
External Quality Review
TEFT

2nd Annual CMS National Medicaid/CHIP Quality Conference: Improving Care and Proving It!

Baltimore, Maryland -- June 14-15, 2012

The second annual CMS Medicaid/CHIP Quality Conference: Improving Care and Proving It! was held on June 14-15, 2012 at the Sheraton Inner Harbor Hotel in Baltimore, MD.  The Conference included breakout sessions on data collection and use, children's health care quality measurement, as well as preventive and oral health.  The Conference also highlighted CMS priority initiatives and included State technical assistance and resources for Medicaid and CHIP quality measurement. Presentations and other conference materials will be available soon!

National Quality Strategy

The National Quality Strategy, required by The Affordable Care Act of 2010, is a national plan to improve the delivery of health care services, patient health outcomes, and population health.

Three goals are used to guide and assess local, state, and national efforts to improve health and the health care delivery system:

  1. Better Care
  2. Healthy People/Healthy Communities
  3. Affordable Care

See the National Quality Strategy March 2011 Report to Congress.   

Recent Reports to Congress

Demonstration Grant for Testing Experience and Functional Assessment Tools (TEFT):

On August 24, 2012 the Centers for Medicaid and Medicaid Services (CMS) released a four year funding opportunity announcement to states and territories  funded by Section 2701 of the Affordable Care Act. CMS will offer $45 million to ten qualified state applicants over four years. The grant program, known and TEFT (Demonstration Grant for Testing Experience and Functional Assessment Tools (TEFT) in Community-Based Long Term Services and Supports) is designed to test quality measurement tools and demonstrate e-health in Medicaid long term services and supports. The TEFT initiative also includes contracts for technical assistance and evaluation, and two Interagency Agreements with the Department of Defense and the Office of the National Coordinator. For more information on TEFT, and to see the grant solicitation, go to the following link

TEFT Solicitation Q and A

Third Applicant Teleconference:The third applicant teleconference for the TEFT Grant is scheduled for Oct 12, 2012 from 2:00  - 3PM (EST). HIT/HIE questions will be addressed.  Both the Department of Defense and the Office of the National Coordinator will be participating to answer questions.

When:October 12, 2012

Time:  2:00PM - 3:00 PM EST

Phone: 1-877-267-1577  Meeting ID: 1344

Purpose of Call: Focus on HIT/HIE Components of TEFT Grant Solicitation