Physician care premiums for seniors could rise by $1.50 per month more than expected, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) announced. Medicare beneficiaries had already been expecting a significant 12 percent jump in their Medicare Part B care premiums, from $78.20 to $87.70. The previous year, monthly premiums rose 17 percent. "This is an area of major concern for us," said CMS administrator Mark B. McClellan. CMS officials said that greater-than-anticipated spending for physician services would drive the number skyward more than they predicted earlier, when the Medicare trustees' report was released. Read more »
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services posted quality performance data for "nearly all" the nation's hospitals on its new "Hospital Compare" Web site. About 4,200 hospitals have reported data on at least 10 performance measures for posting on the site. The comparisons also may be found at Medicare's main Web site or obtained by calling 1-800-Medicare. The data allow consumers to compare local hospitals based on the care they give for heart attacks, heart failure, and pneumonia. Some hospitals are reporting data on up to 17 measures, CMS said. Read more »
Republicans are deeply divided over the tough trade-offs they must make among tax cuts, popular spending programs and deficit reduction as leaders begin trying to strike a bicameral budget deal. Conservatives view entitlement programs, such as Medicaid, as prime targets to help scale back government spending. However, when the Senate debated its budget blueprint (S Con Res 18) on the floor last month, senators voted to strike a chunk of the spending cuts the document called for, and also to dramatically increase its tax cut proposal. Those two impulses—to avoid politically painful benefit reductions while also calling for more tax cuts—put the budget on a collision course with a faction of the Republican party deeply concerned about the deficit. Read more »
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas, R–Calif., has asked the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to compile information about hospitals' uncompensated medical care for a hearing to be scheduled possibly in May. Jon Ratner, assistant director of Medicare payment issues at GAO, said the agency is gathering data that individual states have collected on hospitals' uncompensated care, which includes "charity care" and bad debt. Depending on the state, the entity contacted could be a health department or another agency that deals with Medicaid, the shared federal-state health care program for the poor. Read more »
The announcement that Medicare spending on physician care is accelerating much more rapidly than expected will intensify efforts to measure the quality and efficiency of treatment by doctors, according to a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services official. But how Medicare payment policy otherwise will be affected by the doubling of the spending growth rate in 2004 was not immediately clear. Physicians' organizations are growing more nervous about whether Congress will act this year to erase a projected cut of 4 to 5 percent in their 2006 Medicare payments. Read more »