MedPAC – The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission's (committee that reports to Congress) recommendations for your referral sources. Hospitals – a fiscal year 2011 payment update equal to the rate of change in the market basket index, currently projected at 2.4 percent, concurrent with implementation of a pay-for-performance program. The commission also recommended that Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius reduce the inpatient update by up to 2 percent in 2011, 2012 and 2013 to reflect changes in documentation and coding, which would result in an inpatient update of just 0.4 percent in FY 2011.
Physicians: MedPAC recommended that Congress give physicians a 1 percent payment update in FY 2011, and repeated previous recommendations to increase fee-for-service payments for practitioners who focus on primary care.
Post-Acute: MedPAC recommended that Congress provide no payment update in fiscal year 2011 for inpatient rehabilitation facilities, long-term care hospitals, skilled nursing facilities or home health providers.
For home health, the commission said Congress also should direct the Health and Human Services secretary to rebase rates to reflect the average cost of providing care; expeditiously modify the home health prospective payment system to protect beneficiaries from stinted or low-quality care; identify groups of beneficiaries most likely to benefit from home health and develop outcomes measures for quality of care; and review home health agencies with unusual patterns of claims and implement safeguards in areas that appear to be high risk.
For hospice providers, the commission recommended that Congress provide a 2011 payment update of market basket minus productivity.
