Fifty-eight members of the House of Representatives have written to House leadership asking them to delay the continued implementation of Affordable Care Act-mandated Medicare disproportionate share (Medicare DSH) cuts.

The letter, to House Speaker John Boehner and minority leader Nancy Pelosi, notes that

…hospitals that qualify for Medicare DSH are, by definition, the very providers caring for the greatest numbers of low-income and low-income elderly patients.  In recent years, hospitals have incurred $270 billion in Medicare cuts, including reductions in their annual cost-of-living adjustments, penalties through Medicare’s value-based purchasing and readmissions reduction programs, reduced Medicare bad debt reimbursement, and continued cuts from sequestration.  Medicare DSH cuts at this time could jeopardize the health care safety net that our constituents and yours need and deserve.

Medicare DSH payments are vital to the nation’s private  safety-net hospitals, and the National Association of Urban Hospitals had been urging Congress to delay Medicare DSH cuts for the past three years.  Most recently, NAUH asked House members to sign onto a bill delaying Medicare DSH cuts for two years.

Read the entire congressional letter here.