The Urban Institute, funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) recently released, "The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation: Activity on Many Fronts," which explores the first year of operation of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (CMMI). The paper argues that although CMMI has a long list of accomplishments, some observers express concern that its fast-paced approach may be overwhelming to smaller delivery systems. The paper provides a comprehensive review of CMMI's activities to date, including a survey of the goals envisioned by Congress. The authors address CMMI's major initiatives, including those that address primary care redesign, bundled payments, ACOs, dual-eligible beneficiaries, and the health care system’s capacity for spreading innovative ideas.

The Commonwealth issue brief, "Identifying, Monitoring, and Assessing Promising Innovations: Using Evaluation to Support Rapid-Cycle Change," reviews the mission of The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation (Innovation Center) and provides perspectives from the research community on critical issues and challenges. This issue brief focuses on three requirements the Innovation Center must address to meet its objectives: 1) focusing on research-based changes that have the potential to achieve significant impact on improving quality and lowering costs; 2) documenting innovation testing and goals and tracking implementation and performances; and 3) generating evidence requisite to support broad-based policy change. To support these goals, the Affordable Care Act (ACA), has provided the Innovation Center with $10 billion in funding from 2011 to 2019. The intent is to allow quicker and more effective identification and spread of desirable innovations, with the goal of ultimately modifying Medicare, Medicaid, and the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, created by the Affordable Care Act (ACA), has a mandate to develop innovative payment models to improve health care delivery. The aim of this initiative is to achieve higher quality health care delivery and slower cost growth. The Commonwealth Fund Commission on a Higher Performance Health System's issue brief, "Developing Innovative Payment Approaches: Finding the Path to High Performance," discusses how the development, implementation, and evaluation of new care payment approaches can be improved, and how those improvements can help achieve the broader goals of health reform. The brief focuses largely on Medicare, but also considers how payment innovation pilots should not be limited to Medicare alone. Instead, payment innovations should also include Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) to minimize the fragmented nature in which health care is provided.