Reduction in Medicare Physician Fee Schedule still moving forward
Posted by Guest Blogger on Fri, Dec 04, 2009 @ 05:03 PM
By Ellis Weeker, M.D.
Last Friday, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released the 2010 Physician Fee Schedule Final Rule. The agency is announcing that unless Congress intervenes to prevent the cut from occurring, there will be a 21.2% reduction in the Medicare physician fee schedule conversion factor, effective January 1, 2010.
This proposed reduction is due to Congress failing to permanently address the Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR) formula used to calculate annual updates in physician payments under Medicare.
At present, Congress is debating various ways to address the SGR problem but as of this writing, they have been unable to pass legislation. It's possible that Congress could include a temporary fix in the healthcare reform legislation, but nothing is set in stone at this point. If Congress fails to rescind the SGR cut before early December, it's possible the cut could take place only to be rescinded later as has happened in the past.
The challenge is not coming up with an alternative to the SGR formula, but figuring out how to pay for the fix. According to the Congressional Budget Office, simply freezing physician payments for the next 10 years, in lieu of the scheduled cuts, would increase the deficit in the Medicare Trust Fund by more than $240 Billion over the next 10 years.
While it's likely that Congress will take action to prevent the 21.2% cut from taking place, it's still not certain. Click on this link to voice your concern to strongly encourage Congress to fix this situation soon enough to prevent the types of administrative problems that occurred a few years ago - when Congress rescinded the SGR cut after it had already taken effect.
This is an important time to let your voice be heard, so please take a moment to contact your Senator and Representative today.