EP324: ACOs (Accountable Care Organizations): Do They, in Fact, Improve the Quality of Care and Reduce Costs? With Nicole Bradberry and Kelly Conroy

In Episode 324, Stacey Richter talks with Nicole Bradberry, CEO of the Florida Association of ACOs, and Kelly Conroy, director at Pinnacle Healthcare Consulting, about whether ACOs actually improve quality and reduce costs — and what separates the high performers from the unimpressive national average.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN

✅ Why the average ACO shows less than 1% net savings, and what separates high performers from the pack

✅ How Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP) ACO attribution and shared savings actually work

✅ Why patient engagement and physician engagement are equally critical success factors

✅ What data-driven benchmarking contributes to a successful ACO

✅ Why home health and behavioral health belong in a well-rounded ACO care team

WHY THIS MATTERS

A recent white paper found that the average ACO nets less than 1% in savings per beneficiary with only modest quality gains — not exactly a ringing endorsement of the model. But Nicole Bradberry and Kelly Conroy have both built ACOs that far outperform that average, and their experience points to what separates success from mediocrity: patient and physician engagement, smart use of data, and a willingness to treat fee-for-service, not each other, as the real competition.

=== LINKS ===

🔗 Show Notes with all mentioned links: Episode Page

🔗 Healthcare Industry Acronyms and Terms

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=== MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE ===

🔗 EP321 (Apple) / EP321 (Spotify) with Rich Klasco, MD

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00:00 Introduction.

05:44 ACOs: What's in it for the patient?

08:10 Is the upside of ACOs enough to justify the cost?

11:23 "You can either keep on doing what you're doing and end up like Blockbuster, or you can really pivot and be Netflix."—Nicole

12:26 Why would MIPS incentivize providers to sign up for an ACO?

15:22 What are the big ACO failures?

18:27 "Just as patient engagement is a number one key success indicator, so is physician engagement."—Kelly

19:57 "It's not individual benchmarks; it's the whole ACO."—Kelly

20:15 "Honestly, data is key to that conversation."—Nicole

21:55 EP321 with Rich Klasco, MD.

22:14 What are the essentials for a successful ACO?

27:31 Who do you need to add to the ACO mix?

28:55 How does home health play into the ACO system?

29:33 "The whole behavioral health—just adding in a really good care team."—Kelly

29:48 "There's just a whole host of things that having all this data opens up the physician and the provider's eyes."—Kelly

32:56 "We really think fee for service is the competition."—Kelly