New Pathways for Primary Care: An Update on Primary Care Programs From the Innovation Center at CMS

Those in practice fi nd that the fee-for-service system does not adequately value the contributions made by primary care. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (Innovation Center) was created by the Affordable Care Act to test new models of health care delivery to improve the quality of care while lowering costs. All programs coming out of the Innovation Center are tests of new pay-ment and service delivery models. By changing both payment and delivery mod-els and moving to a payment model that rewards physicians for quality of care instead of volume of care, we may be able to achieve the kind of health care patients want to receive and primary care physicians want to provide. Ann Fam Med 2012;10:152-155. doi:10.1370/afm.1366. Primary care could be so much more than it is today. Those in practice aspire to deliver excellent care all the time, yet many feel frustrated by constraints of time and money as they struggle to incorporate bur-geoning responsibilities.1 Physician organizations and some policy makers have argued that the fee-for-service system does not adequately value the contributions made by primary care.2 Meanwhile, many practicing primar