MHQP Looks Forward to Serving on State’s New Primary Care Task Force

(March 2025)

In January 2025, Governor Maura Healey signed Chapter 343 of the Acts of 2024, An Act Enhancing the Market Review Process. Section 80 of this Act establishes a new 25-member Task Force on primary care access, delivery, and financial sustainability in the Commonwealth, to be co-chaired by the Executive Office of Health and Human Services and the Massachusetts Health Policy Commission.

MHQP is honored to be included in the legislation as a member of the Task Force and pleased that the Massachusetts Primary Care Dashboard we produce with the Center for Health Information and Analysis (CHIA) will be the measurement instrument for this extremely important work.

MHQP’s President and CEO, Barbra Rabson, will serve as MHQP’s representative on the Task Force.

The Task Force is charged with developing a series of recommendations to stabilize and strengthen the primary care system across Massachusetts, including:

  • Define primary care services
  • Develop a standardized set of data reporting requirements for payers, providers, and provider organizations to track payments for primary care services
  • Establish a primary care spending target for public and private payers
  • Propose payment models to increase primary care reimbursements
  • Assess the impact of health plan design on health equity and patient access to primary care services
  • Monitor and track the needs of and service delivery to Massachusetts residents
  • Create workforce development plans to increase the supply and distribution, and improve the working conditions, of the primary care workforce

“I am honored to serve on this Task Force and thrilled that the Primary Care Dashboard will be an important resource for this work,” says Rabson. “MHQP has been sounding the alarm for some time that our state’s primary care system is in crisis and that our frontline clinicians are stressed and overburdened. The formation of this Task Force is a critical step toward policy shifts that will prioritize investments in primary care to improve the health of our residents.”

The first meeting of the Task Force will take place on April 16, 2025, from 10:00 am – 12:00 noon at the HPC office (50 Milk Street, 8th Floor, Boston). The meeting will be livestreamed. More information will be available in the coming weeks.