Do Readmission Rates Vary by Primary Care Provider?

The Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program penalizes hospitals for excess 30-day readmissions, and the Merit-based Incentive Payment System is a pay-for-performance incentive for primary care providers (PCP) to reduce readmissions. Yet the exact factors that influence hospital readmissions remain unclear. In this study, researchers used a Texas Medicare claims database to examine whether rates vary by PCP.

This study included more than 500,000 hospitalized patients who were discharged between 2012 and 2015 and who had an identifiable PCP in the year before hospitalization. The mean 30-day readmission rate was 13%, with little variation among the identified PCPs (11%–15%). Among more than 4000 PCPs evaluated, each with at least 50 readmissio…