On September 28, 2011, CMS announced a new “Comprehensive Primary Care” (CPC) initiative, designed to help primary care practices deliver higher quality, better coordinated, and more patient-centered care. The program is being established under section 3021 of the ACA, which authorized CMS to test innovative payment and service delivery models that reduce spending under Medicare, Medicaid or CHIP, while preserving or enhancing the quality of care. The CPC initiative will test both a service delivery and payment model. The service delivery model will test comprehensive primary care, which has the following functions: risk-stratified care management; access and continuity; planned care for chronic conditions and preventative care; patient and caregiver engagement; and coordination of care across the medical neighborhood. The payment model includes a risk-adjusted monthly care management fee paid to the selected primary care practices for their fee-for-service Medicare beneficiaries (estimated to be $20 in the first two years, and about $15 in years three and four). In addition, providers have the potential to share in any Medicare savings in years two through four of the initiative. Practices also will receive compensation from other payers participating in the initiative, including private insurers, to enable them “to integrate multi-payer funding streams to strengthen their capacity to implement practice-wide quality improvement.” The voluntary initiative will begin as a demonstration project in five to seven health care markets, with approximately 75 primary care practices in each market. CMS currently is soliciting public and private health care payers for the initiative; once payers and markets have been selected, primary care practices will be recruited and selected in those markets. Public and private health care payers interested in applying must submit a Letter of Intent by November 15, 2011.