How the ESRD Quality Incentive Program Could Potentially Improve Quality of Life for Patients on Dialysis

For over 20 years, the quality of medical care of the Medicare ESRD Program has been a concern. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services have implemented the ESRD Quality Incentive Program, which uses the principles of value-based purchasing; dialysis providers are paid for performance on predefined quality measures, with a goal of improving patient outcomes and the quality of patient care. The ESRD Quality Incentive Program measures have been criticized, because they are largely disease oriented and use easy-to-obtain laboratory-based indicators, such as Kt/V and hemoglobin, that do not reflect outcomes that are most important to patients and have had a minimal effect on survival or quality of life. A key goal of improving quality of care is to enhance quality of life, a patient-important quality measure that matters more to many patients than even survival. None of the ESRD Quality Incentive Program measures assess patient-reported quality of life. As outlined in the National Quality Strategy, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services are holding providers accountable in six priority domains, in which quality measures have been and are being developed for value-based purchasing. Three measures—patient experience and engagement, clinical care, and care coordination—are particularly relevant to quality care in the ESRD Program; the 2014 ESRD Quality Incentive Program includes six measures, none of which provide data from a patient-centered perspective. Value-based purchasing is a well intentioned step to improve care of patients on dialysis. However, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services need to implement significant change in what is measured for the ESRD Quality Incentive Program to be patient centered and aligned with patients' values, preferences, and needs. This paper provides examples of potential quality measures for patient experience and engagement, clinical care, and care coordination, which if implemented, would be much more likely to enhance quality of life for patients with ESRD than present ESRD Quality Incentive Program measures.