Inadequate Data Hinders Federal Approach to Health Equity
Federal efforts to develop and improve payment models and other programs designed to foster health equity are often hamstrung by poor data: inconsistent data requests from program to program and flawed and incomplete data reporting by those participating in those [...]
Federal Health Policy Update for July 13
The following is the latest health policy news from the federal government for June 30 – July 13. Some of the language used below is taken directly from government documents. 340B CMS has published a proposed regulation outlining how it [...]
ASH Comments on Proposed Medicaid Managed Care Regulation
ASH has urged the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to proceed with caution when attempting to update regulations governing Medicaid managed care. In a letter to CMS in response to the proposed regulation, the Alliance of Safety-Net Hospitals expresses [...]
Federal Health Policy Update for June 29
The following is the latest health policy news from the federal government for June 23-29. Some of the language used below is taken directly from government documents. The White House President Biden has issued an executive order on strengthening access [...]
MedPAC Urges Congress to Embrace Site-Neutral Medicare Outpatient Payments
Medicare should pay for outpatient care on a site-neutral basis, MedPAC has told Congress in its annual recommendations. Proponents of such a change – including the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission – argue that Medicare should not pay more for services [...]
Federal Health Policy Update for June 22
The following is the latest health policy news from the federal government for June 9-22. Some of the language used below is taken directly from government documents. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services CMS has announced new flexibilities to help [...]
MACPAC Proposes New Approach to DSH, Helping Safety-Net Hospitals
To improve “…the relationship between total state and federal DSH [Medicaid disproportionate share] funding and the number of non-elderly low-income individuals in a state,” the Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission has urged Congress to direct the Department of [...]
ASH Differs With CMS on Identifying Safety-Net Hospitals
There are better ways to identify safety-net hospitals than by using the “safety-net index” developed by MedPAC for that purpose, ASH has written to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services in response to that suggestion in a request for [...]
ASH Objects to Proposed Medicare DSH Cut
Medicare should increase, not decrease, Medicare disproportionate share payments (Medicare DSH) in FY 2024, ASH has written to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services in response to that agency’s proposal to cut its Medicare DSH uncompensated care pool by [...]
ASH Protests Medicare’s Proposed FY 2024 Inpatient Rate Increase
The proposed increase in Medicare inpatient rates for FY 2024 is inadequate, ASH has written in a letter to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. In its letter, ASH wrote that In the proposed rule CMS calls for increasing [...]
