The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) new Bundled Payments for Care Improvement-Advanced (BPCI-A) schema, due to launch this October, may have unintended consequences that could adversely affect provider incentives, according to a new analysis by Liao, et al., published on the Health Affairs blog.

BPCI-A, they claimed, has the potential also to create intra-system conflicts with providers who participate in other alternative payment models (APMs) like the Medicare Shared Savings Program (MSSP). BPCI-A providers also might find themselves at a reimbursement disadvantage.

“When BPCI providers participate in MSSP ACOs that achieve shared savings, BPCI episode savings could contribute to those MSSP savings. Therefore, Medicare recoups the portion of the episode discount paid out as shared savings,” the authors wrote.

“Ultimately, this additional recoupment adds a wrinkle into the dynamic created by overlap: BPCI providers may see a smaller financial upside based on MSSP ACO performance,” they cautioned.

Read their full analysis here, on the Health Affairs blog.