The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) March 17 unveiled a new tool that maps geographic disparities in chronic diseases among Medicare beneficiaries. The Mapping Medicare Disparities tool displays geographic differences in health care outcome, utilization, and cost – including measures such as disease prevalence, Medicare spending, hospital and emergency department utilization, preventable hospitalizations, readmission rates, and mortality – for 18 chronic conditions.
CMS Acting Administrator Andy Slavitt stated, “Our commitment to health equity begins with properly measuring the care people get and having an honest dialogue on how and where we need to improve. Today’s tool aims to make it harder for disparities to go unaddressed.”