In August 2020, the Virginia Center for Health Innovation (VCHI) launched the Virginia Task Force on Primary Care, which aims to:

• Build a stakeholder coalition to direct primary care support and advance the use of data/communication systems for action;

• Define payment models to better support primary care and support practice viability through systems that allow for predictability in financial support;

• Describe the infrastructure needed to support primary care;

• Identify markers of high value care in the COVID and post COVID era to function as quality metrics; and

• Promote innovations in telehealth, population health management, and outreach to adapt to the changing COVID environment.

The 31 task force members, comprised of primary care clinicians, employers, health plan representatives, patient advocates, and state government leaders from the executive and legislative branches defined success as:

• Clinicians and payers establish a better relationship in order to partner in seeking better health and lower costs for Virginians;

• Primary care services are accessible, integrated, equitable, convenient, and affordable for patients in all Virginia communities;

• Virginia promotes a positive primary care practice experience for clinicians, leading to retention and growth in the number of primary care providers;

• The viability of primary care practices is safeguarded, primary care payment is predictable and tied to meaningful performance measurement in order to advance better health care value, and primary care is less susceptible to changes in the economy; and

• Positive primary care innovations, such as telehealth, adopted during the pandemic are maintained and advanced where needed.

The task force was funded in Year 1 with a $204,610 grant from Arnold Ventures and the support and engagement of Governor Ralph Northam and Virginia Secretary of Health and Human Resources, Daniel Carey, MD. The task force was then funded in year two through a $297,295 contract with the Virginia Department of Medical Assistance Services.