House Approves Amendment To Appropriations Bill To Block Medicare Inpatient Hospital Reimbursement Reduction

July 25, 2007 – 11:01 pm | posted in Medicare

The House on Thursday voted 412-12 to approve an amendment to a fiscal year 2008 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill (HR 3043) to block a provision in a rule proposed by CMS that would reduce Medicare inpatient hospital reimbursements by 2.4%, CQ HealthBeat reports (Reichard, CQ HealthBeat, 7/20).

The “behavioral offset” provision of the rule, which would revise the Medicare inpatient hospital reimbursement system in FY 2008, addresses the expectation that hospitals will “upcode,” or bill the program for services reimbursed at higher rates, in response to changes that would link payments with the severity of the illnesses of patients (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 6/19).

Rep. Jerry Weller (R-Ill.) said that the provision would “punish the hospitals before they’ve done anything wrong,” adding that the amendment would ensure “any adjustments made for coding changes will be based on the actual experiences of the hospitals, not mere conjecture.” However, “it’s uncertain how much the House vote means,” as President Bush has threatened to veto the broader bill because of the level of spending included in the legislation, CQ HealthBeat reports.

Federation of American Hospitals President Chip Kahn said that the “underlying bill obviously has issues” but added that he hopes the House vote on the amendment will prompt CMS to drop the provision from the final rule. The vote “shows overwhelming concern about the effect of this rule,” Kahn said, adding, “I’m hopeful they will get the message” at CMS (CQ HealthBeat, 7/20).

“Reprinted with permission from http://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery at http://www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/healthpolicy. The Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation . © 2005 Advisory Board Company and Kaiser Family Foundation. All rights reserved.

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