Association Between the Proportion of Black Patients Cared for at Hospitals and Financial Penalties Under Value-Based Payment Programs

A study is presented which evaluates whether US hospitals with mostly Black patients are more likely than other hospitals to have penalties associated with Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) value-based payment programs. Over the last decade, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has implemented national value-based payment programs that aim to incentivize hospitals to deliver higher quality of care. Black adults face systemic barriers in health care access and often receive care at a limited set of underresourced hospitals. Although recent changes have been made to some value-based programs to reduce the burden of penalties on safety-net hospitals that serve low-income patients, whether these initiatives disparately affect hospitals that care for a high proportion of Black patients remains unclear.