fah hospital policy blog

The newly released IPPS Proposed Rule goes a long way to putting patients first.

The House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee held a Red Tape Relief Initiative roundtable earlier this week focused reducing regulatory burdens on hospitals. Committee leaders framed this as a unique chance for Members to hear from industry professionals about how Congress can improve Medicare so that it works more effectively for both patients and medical providers.

In a good report full of facts and figures, it is tempting to pick out one or two and claim they prove your point. Unfortunately, this morning’s (March 22nd) Axios Vitals selectively used data from MedPAC’s March Report to Congress to suggest that hospitals lose money on Medicare because they are inefficient. The blurb entitled “Let’s talk about hospitals’ Medicare margins” misses what is arguably MedPAC’s most compelling data point: 331 “relatively efficient” hospitals experienced a negative Medicare margin in 2016. It’s on page 86 – just two pages past the points highlighted by Axios.

FAH recently submitted a comment letter to CMS on the 2019 Medicare Advantage (MA) and Part D Advance Notice and Draft Call Letter. FAH urged CMS to use caution when allowing MA organizations (MAOs) greater flexibility regarding cost-sharing and benefit design (e.g., tiered cost-sharing, increased cost-sharing to manage utilization, and new interpretation of the uniformity requirements), as these changes could limit transparency and increase beneficiary costs and confusion.