The move towards a delivery system for healthcare based on value has brought recent changes to the factors involved with physician compensation. In a HealthLeaders article titled “Physician Pay Increasingly Linked to Value-based Metrics,” Christopher Cheney examines why primary care physicians told MGMA almost six percent of their compensation was linked with quality guidelines in 2013, a number at only three percent in 2012.

The Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) started gathering data in 2012 on doctors who had portions of income linked to quality and customer satisfaction metrics. Polls of primary care physicians in 2013 showed that an average of 5.96% of total compensation was linked to measures of quality, showing a modest level of linkage with compensation and value-based measurements, but according to Todd Evenson, VP of data solutions at MGMA, this is just the tip of a strongly growing trend. MGMA needs to set a baseline of data that will be a guide as more compensation is switched to quality metrics.

Ingrid Lindberg, chief customer experience officer at Eagan Prime Therapeutics, says this trend will continue strongly because people want to be treated not like patients, but like people, with their time, questions, and respect. She claims this will put emphasis not only on the quality of care but also the experience that is provided to the patient. Some critics of the switch believe that addressing lifestyles that lead to expensive medical care can do more to reduce healthcare costs than linking pay with value. Despite these criticisms, Todd Evenson says MGMA will be committed to guiding medical practitioners as quality metrics become increasingly tied together with physician compensation.

If you’re in healthcare, insurance, technology or other professional services industries, and need help with a PR, marketing or social media campaign, contact Scott Public Relations.

Like what you’ve read? Follow Scott Public Relations on Facebook , Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Google+. For convenient blog updates, sign up for the Einsight RSS feed!

(Note: Many internet browser platforms are discontinuing their internal RSS reader. If you are viewing this in Google Chrome the RSS feed will not work properly since they discontinued Google Reader. If you have an independent reader set up already you should be fine. If you do not, may we suggest you look to Digg Reader, AOL Reader, or our personal favorite – Feedly to handle your RSS feeds. Happy reading.)