In 2022, Mr. Cuban co-founded Cost Plus Drugs, an online pharmacy that sells generic medications at a 15% markup and flat $5 shipping fee, posting its full price list publicly and bypassing traditional pharmacy benefit managers and wholesalers. Now he’s directing the same transparency logic toward how hospitals and health systems get paid through “Cost Plus Wellness,” a direct contracting platform that connects self-insured employers with providers through publicly posted contracts.

Expanding the CJR Model Is a Logical Step in VBC, but Implementation Challenges Remain

CMS is proposing to make its joint replacement bundled payment model mandatory nationwide. Experts say it is a logical step, but warn that mandatory participation could be challenging for hospitals to implement.  The CJR Model holds hospitals responsible for Medicare spending for joint replacement surgery, the hospital stay and the first 90 days of recovery. Between 2016 and 2024, the CJR Model was tested in 34 metropolitan areas. The expanded model (called CJR-X) would be made mandatory nationwide and begin October 1, 2027.

Affordability, transparency: A look at large employers' top healthcare concerns

The Purchaser Business Group on Health has released new data that highlights some of the key healthcare priorities of its jumbo employer members, with—perhaps unsurprisingly—the escalating affordability crisis as the biggest challenge.  Rounding out the top three priorities are data analytics and transparency, as well as an interest in advanced primary care. PBGH based the findings of a survey of more than two dozens of its members, which represent some of the largest employers in the United States.