Online Tool Helps Community Oncology Practices Gauge Readiness for Enhancing Oncology Model

In an interview, Shiela Plasencia, director of practice support at the Community Oncology Alliance (COA), discussed COA’s new tool to help practices prepare for the Enhancing Oncology Model (EOM). The model aims to focus on patient-centered care and build off of the Oncology Care Model, which ended in June 2022.

Q: Can you discuss the online tool that Community Oncology Alliance (COA) has developed to help practices gauge their readiness for the Enhancing Oncology Model (EOM)?

Shiela Plasencia: Yeah, so we've really worked to create a bi-directional tool with Avalere [Health]. And what we've done is taken the formulas for the EOM and built out an Excel document that the practices will be able to utilize, then they'll be able to input their own data. So, it's individual, and really helps assess and gauge what their performance will look like in the model. And it really gives them the opportunity to drill down. If they see an area where maybe they're not going to do so well, what would we have to tweak and do differently if we wanted to be able to impact that outcome?

Q: Can you describe the amount or quality of feedback you’ve received from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation Center on specific elements of the EOM?

Shiela Plasencia: Yeah, so those are great questions and something that everybody's asking about, and we just haven't really heard a lot of feedback from them, other than there had to be changes to the model to be able to come to the table with something where everybody would come out okay. And they have determined that that lesser [monthly enhanced oncology services] is doable, and the model would be achievable utilizing that amount.