The ACO ‘Savings Confusion’

Reading through our past coverage of the Medicare accountable care organization (ACO) program can produce a lot of confusion—like these two seemingly conflicting headlines:

Medicare ACOs - The Enrollment & The Savings Are Increasing
ACOs Shared Savings Raised Federal Costs By $384 Million Between 2013 & 2016

The first headline is related to recently released data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), which showed that in 2016, ACOs across all Medicare ACO programs generated $784 billion in savings—the highest amount we'd seen yet (see Medicare ACOs-The Enrollment & The Savings Are Increasing). There are . . .