If you aren’t in an accountable care organization or planning to join one, chances are you are just plain sick of hearing about them.

Some people have called ACOs the HMOs of today, indicating they are likely to be just another newfangled idea for containing healthcare costs that will die along the wayside.

If you aren’t in an accountable care organization or planning to join one, chances are you are just plain sick of hearing about them.

Some people have called ACOs the HMOs of today, indicating they are likely to be just another newfangled idea for containing healthcare costs that will die along the wayside.

Mark McClellan, MD, former Administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services recently tried to squelch negative thinking about ACOs.

At the Second Annual National Accountable Care Organization Summit June 27 in Washington, DC, McClellan, who is now the director of the Engelberg Center for Health Care Reform at the Brookings Institution, predicted ACOs “aren’t going away.”

ACOs are part of the Affordable Care Act, a comprehensive strategy to get better care at a lower cost. “They are not a bunch of reforms we’re throwing up against the wall to see what sticks,” he said.

Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said the federal government is currently reviewing more than 1200 comments it received on a March ACO proposed rule. Sebelius said she "is confident" the final ACO rule will find the best balance of stabilizing costs and protecting patients.

Debra Ness, president of the National Partnership for Women and Families said, “When your really peal back the onion of what patients want, you get to the same patient-centered criteria we are putting into ACOs.”

Brian Yeaman is chief medical information officer (CMIO) of Oklahoma-based Normal Regional Health System. The 450-bed hospital is among the top most wired community-based hospitals in the country. He said the federal government is asking for too much, too soon with ACOs. 

 “We can stand up the technology,” he said. “The reality of getting nurses and doctors to learn how to use the tool is another matter. They are already overwhelmed. Doctors can’t learn all of these new workflows and keep care safe.”

Yeaman isn’t alone in his thinking. Many major stakeholders back his view.

Above all, the most worrisome complaint about ACOs is how they require physicians to reverse engines on a fee-for-service platform. This is all fine and dandy, but who will cover a physician’s expenses during the transition in the other direction?

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