SCCIPA joins Cisco, Intel, Oracle for Pay for Performance program

SCCIPA announced today that it has joined The Silicon Valley Pay-for-Performance Consortium of leading technology companies including Cisco, Intel and Oracle and medical groups that will reward doctors who use technology to share information and improve patient care. Initially, Cisco, Intel, and Oracle will pay financial incentives to participants based on measurements in three key categories: evidence-based care, care management, and patient education.

A critical first initiative for the consortium is implementing a "Pay-for-Performance" (P4P) program using the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) Physician Practice Connections (PPC) program. By establishing rewards for the use of processes and technology, the consortium hopes to accelerate the transition to electronic health records and the use of automated decision support tools. Such tools can help doctors determine which course of therapy might be best for a particular patient given the latest science and medical and family histories.

The acceleration of P4P programs is labeled a national priority by the Department of Health and Human Services, which is driving numerous initiatives to improve healthcare quality through the adoption of information technologies. The number of programs has tripled in the United States since 2003, now numbering more than 100. Cisco, Intel and Oracle targeted the consortium medical groups and IPAs because they treat many of the companies' employees based in Northern California. The companies involved intend to expand the consortium where they have large concentrations of employees.