Evaluation of Clinical and Economic Outcomes following Implementation of a Medicare Pay-for-Performance Program for Surgical Procedures

Abstract

Importance: Surgical complications increase hospital costs by approximately $20000 per admission and extend hospital stays by 9.7 days. Improving surgical care quality and reducing costs is needed for patients undergoing surgery, health care professionals, hospitals, and payers. Objective: To evaluate the association of the Hospital-Acquired Conditions Present on Admission (HAC-POA) program, a mandated national pay-for-performance program by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, with surgical care quality and costs. Design, Setting, and Participants: A cross-sectional study of Medicare inpatient surgical care stays from October 2004 through September 2017 in the US was conducted. The National Inpatient Sample and a propensity score-weighted difference-in-differences analysis of hospital stays with associated primary surgical procedures was used to compare changes in outcomes for the intervention and control procedures before and after HAC-POA program implementation. The sample consisted of 1317262 inpatient surgical episodes representing 1198665 stays for targeted procedures and 118597 stays for nontargeted procedures. Analyses were performed between November 1, 2020, and May 7, 2021. Exposures: Implementation of the HAC-POA program for the intervention procedures included in this study (fiscal year 2009). Main Outcomes and Measures: Incidence of surgical site infections and deep vein thrombosis, length of stay, in-hospital mortality, and hospital costs. Analyses were adjusted for patient and hospital characteristics and indicators for procedure type, hospital, and year. Results: In our propensity score-weighted sample, the intervention procedures group comprised 1047351 (88.5%) individuals who were White and 742734 (60.6%) women; mean (SD) age was 75 (6.9) years. The control procedures group included 94715 (88.0%) individuals who were White, and 65436 (60.6%) women; mean (SD) age was 75 (7.1) years. After HAC-POA implementation, the incidence of surgical site infections in targeted procedures decreased by 0.3 percentage points (95% CI, -0.5 to -0.1 percentage points; P =.02) compared with nontargeted procedures. The program was associated with a reduction in length of stay by 0.5 days (95% CI, -0.6 to -0.4 days; P