Background: The state of Maryland was granted a waiver by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services to implement a Global Budget Revenue (GBR) reimbursement model. This study aims to compare (1) costs of inpatient hospital stays; (2) postacute care costs; (3) lengths of stay (LOS); and (4) discharge disposition who underwent primary total hip arthroplasty at a single Maryland-based orthopedic institution before and after the implementation of GBR.
Methods: The Maryland Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services database was queried to obtain all Medicare patients who underwent total hip arthroplasty at a single institution before and after the implementation of GBR. We compared the differences in costs for the following: inpatient care, the postacute care period, and readmissions. In addition, we evaluated differences in LOS, discharge disposition, and complication rates.
Results: There was a significant decrease in inpatient costs (26,575vs23,712), an increase in mean home health costs (627vs1608),andadecreaseinmeandurablemedicalequipmentcosts(604 vs $82) and LOS (2.92 days vs 2.33 days). There was an increase in discharge to home rates (72.3% vs 78.9%) and a decrease in discharge to acute rehabilitation (4.3% vs 1.8%)
Conclusion: Under the GBR model, our institution experienced significant cost savings during the inpatient and postacute care episodes. Thus, GBR may serve as a viable solution to reducing costs to Medicare for high-volume arthroplasty institutions with a large Medicare population. Multicentered studies are needed to verify our results
