Physicians may be eligible for an extra incentive payment for participating in a PQRS-approved Maintenance of Certification (MOC) Program. Physicians who elect this option and satisfy the reporting criteria are eligible to earn an incentive payment equal to 0.5% of their estimated total allowed charges for covered Medicare Part B services in 2012, an option authorized by the Physician Protection and Affordable Care Act. This incentive may be earned in addition to the 0.5% incentive payment available for satisfying the standard Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS) requirements. Physicians cannot receive more than one additional MOC incentive even if they complete a MOC Program in more than one specialty.

The American Board of Emergency Medicine’s MOC program has been vetted and approved by CMS for the MOC incentive program. To qualify, ABEM diplomates must meet the annual requirements of the ABEM MOC program, complete required activities, including practice improvement activities and a patient experience of care survey, and participate in the MOC program more frequently than is required to qualify for or maintain board certification status for the calendar year. Participation in both programs is voluntary and ABEM certification of those who choose not to participate in PQRS in 2012 will not be affected.

To qualify for the PQRS MOC incentive, ABEM diplomates must meet the following requirements in 2012:

Participate in standard PQRS reporting: Diplomates must complete standard PQRS reporting requirements for a 12-month period either as an individual eligible professional using individual PQRS measures or measures groups OR by participating under the group practice reporting option. Individual physicians do not need to sign up or pre-register to participate in standard PQRS reporting. Submission of quality data codes to CMS through claims, a CMS-qualified registry, or CMS-qualified registry electronic health record (EHR) indicates a physician’s intent to participate in the 2012 PQRS. Note that ACEP members cannot submit standard PQRS claims or measures through the ABEM.

Complete the required MOC activities for their current year of the certification process: Diplomates can access their MOC requirements for the year by going to the ABEM website and searching for their information.

Meet additional ABEM MOC requirements in 2012:

• Complete one Lifelong Learning and Self Assessment (LLSA) test.
• Complete and report one practice improvement (PI) activity (which does not have to focus on PQRS measures).
• Complete and report one communications/professionalism (CP) patient experience of care survey activity.

Diplomates are required to complete each of these additional activities in 2012, even if they have already met their current ABEM MOC requirements. For those who have already met current ABEM MOC requirements, any additional activities completed in 2012 will only fulfill the PQRS MOC requirement and will not count toward the next 5-year reporting deadline.