What the Move Toward MIPS Value Pathways Means for Podiatry

Your recent item about CMS’s proposal to sunset traditional MIPS raises an important question: What would replace it, and what should podiatrists do to prepare?

MIPS Value Pathways, or MVPs, are already available. They organize reporting around particular specialties or clinical areas, with a narrower selection of quality measures and improvement activities. Thanks to APMA’s efforts, there is already a Podiatry MVP.

Under traditional MIPS, clinicians generally select six quality measures from a broad inventory. In practice, their choices often depend on which measures their EHR supports.

With MVP reporting, the quality measure requirement drops from six measures to four, selected from the measures included in the MVP. For podiatrists, this means fewer measures to report and a selection more relevant to the care we provide. This is a meaningful step toward reducing the burden of MIPS reporting.

You can review the Podiatry MVP’s measures and improvement activities on the CMS website.

The practical challenge is that your EHR may not support four quality measures within the Podiatry MVP. Now is a good time to ask your vendor which measures it supports and which additional podiatry measures it plans to include.

The MVP also narrows the selection of improvement activities. Review those alongside the quality measures to identify activities that fit your practice. You may find that your practice already performs work that can help satisfy these requirements, provided you meet the applicable criteria and maintain the required documentation.

As CMS moves toward specialty-focused reporting, EHR support for podiatry measures becomes increasingly important. Based on my conversations with vendors, ModMed and Populate already support reporting quality measures included in the Podiatry MVP. Over the past few months, I have also discussed expanded support with NextGen, Athelos, Azalea, PracticeEHR and CompUlink. Several have indicated plans to improve their support for podiatry quality reporting for the 2027 reporting period.

I developed five podiatry-specific quality measures included in the Podiatry MVP, addressing hammertoe outcomes, heel pain treatment outcomes, bunion outcomes, wound offloading with remote monitoring, and chronic wound healing outcomes. These measures give podiatrists additional opportunities to report on care relevant to their patients.

I appreciate APMA’s work in developing the Podiatry MVP. I will continue working with EHR vendors and communicating with APMA and CMS to advocate for reporting options that reflect podiatric practice and reduce unnecessary burden.

The practical message is simple: Stay informed, review the Podiatry MVP, and ask your EHR vendor whether it supports the four measures you would want to report. Preparing early can help prevent last-minute surprises.

—Michael L. Brody, DPM

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Disclosure: I am the founder of Registry Clearinghouse, a CMS-approved Qualified Clinical Data Registry. Registry Clearinghouse owns quality measures I developed that are included in the Podiatry MVP. I have no financial stake in any of the EHR companies mentioned in this article.