Common use of Evaluation Budget Clause in Contracts

Evaluation Budget. A budget for the evaluation shall be provided with the evaluation design. It will include the total estimated cost, as well as a breakdown of estimated staff, administrative and other costs for all aspects of the evaluation such as any survey and measurement development, quantitative and qualitative data collection and cleaning, analyses, and reports generation. A justification of the costs may be required by CMS if the estimates provided do not appear to sufficiently cover the costs of the design or if CMS finds that the design is not sufficiently developed. Cost-effectiveness. While not the only purpose of the evaluation, the core purpose of the evaluation is to support a determination as to whether the preponderance of the evidence about the costs and effectiveness of the demonstration when considered in its totality demonstrates cost effectiveness taking into account both initial and longer term costs and other impacts such as improvements in service delivery and health outcomes. The evaluation will explore and explain through developed evidence the effectiveness of the demonstration for each hypothesis, including total costs in accordance with the evaluation design as approved by CMS. Included in the evaluation will be examinations using a robust set of measures of provider access and clinical quality measures under the demonstration compared to what would have happened for a comparable population absent the demonstration. The state will compare total costs under the demonstration to costs of what would have happened without the demonstration. This will include an evaluation of provider rates, healthcare utilization and associated costs, and administrative expenses over time. The State will compare changes in access and quality to associated changes in costs within the demonstration. To the extent possible, component contributions to changes in access and quality and their associated levels of investment will be determined and compared to improvement efforts undertaken in other delivery systems.