Hawaii's largest health insurer and the operator of Hawaii's largest acute-care hospital announced they have entered into a payment agreement that attempts to restructure how hospitals have historically been paid for the healthcare services they provide. Executives at Hawaii Medical Service Association, the local Blue Cross Blue Shield affiliate, and The Queen's Health Systems, which operates, among others, Queen's Medical Center in Honolulu, say the new payment system reimburses hospitals based on the quality and safety level of the care they provide rather than the traditional model of reimbursing them based on the amount of services they perform.
