Any new system in Medicare that adjusts reimbursement levels based on quality of care shouldn't reduce payments to below-average performing providers, quality measurement specialists said. And above-average performers should get more than 1 or 2 percent in extra payments, one of the specialists said during a forum sponsored by the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC). That's the amount Washington policy makers typically propose as a reward for superior or improving care. Both pieces of advice are at odds with recommendations MedPAC made to Congress earlier this year. Read more »
Medicare will spend as much as $60 billion over the next decade to attract preferred provider options (PPOs) to offer coverage to beneficiaries in areas not now served by managed care plans, according to a study published on the Health Affairs Web site. Critics of the research said the findings were premature and based on assumptions that would not prove to be true. The article predicts the PPOs, created as a part of the new Medicare drug law (PL 108-173), will bid competitively to serve Medicare beneficiaries on a regional basis and avoid competing with existing Medicare health maintenance organizations. Read more »
Many residency physicians—who will soon become doctors—are not equipped to provide care for a racially and ethnic diverse population, according to an article published in the Sept. 7 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association. The survey, whose research was supported by The Commonwealth Fund, revealed that about half of resident physicians in their last year of training had received little or no training to provide cross-cultural care during their residency as the immigrant and ethnic population grows in the United States, the Fund said in a news release. Read more »
State Medicaid officials said they want "simple and straightforward" answers from the federal government about financial reimbursement for health services provided to Hurricane Katrina victims. They need to know, for example, how to proceed with Medicaid eligibility for Katrina victims whose Medicaid status cannot immediately be verified and for individuals who now qualify for the program due to losses suffered in the hurricane, Ohio Medicaid Director Barbara Edwards said during a telephone news briefing sponsored by the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Mark B. McClellan said Friday that officials are working on the answers. Read more »
Legislation to promote the adoption of health care information technology (IT) has moved down Congress' priority list as new concerns about spending and responding to Hurricane Katrina have moved to the forefront, congressional aides said. And Katrina's budgetary hit—more than $60 billion to date but expected to rise far higher—creates new doubt about finding money to prevent Medicare payment cuts to doctors and thus their ability to invest in health care IT if the cuts take effect, aides suggested at a Washington D.C. conference. But HHS Secretary Micheal O. Leavitt and other speakers said the devastation caused by the storm is a powerful argument for promoting health care IT. Read more »