November 1 , 2005

 

UPDATED: Urgent Call to Action: Medicare Physician Payment Reform – Congress MUST Act Before End of Year

 

Urgent action is needed to avert Medicare cutbacks on January 1, 2006.  Our message to Congress is simple:  Please work together with the Administration to avoid any cuts in the Part B Medicare conversion factor (CF) for 2006 and beyond and for a positive update instead.

Soon to be considered before the U.S. House of Representatives is a budget proposal that contains no fix for physician payments whatsoever. The corresponding proposal in the U.S. Senate includes a 1-year payment increase of 1% for 2006 but ties the increase to the implementation of a problematic pay-for-performance system.

Congress must act to correct the unfair impact of the Medicare SGR formula and avert Medicare physician payments cuts of 4.4 percent beginning January 1, 2006. 

Please go to the ASA Legislative Action Center to e-mail or fax your Senators or Representatives now!  ASA members must join all of organized medicine in letting Congress know that Medicare CF cutbacks are unacceptable and cannot be allowed to occur.  Congress can and must act now or cuts will occur soon across all of Medicare Part B.  The legislative clock is ticking, and every day there is less time to avoid this rollback. Only with Congressional action will a positive Medicare update occur.

Under current law, if Medicare Part B spending goes up more than the average rate of economic growth in the United States in any one year, then physicians and other Part B providers have to absorb these costs in reimbursement cuts the next year as Medicare calculates and applies the Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR).

Every year there are more and more seniors, living longer, with enhanced opportunities for innovative medical interventions and life-saving surgery through Medicare.  The SGR presumes that physicians can work single-handedly to restrain this growth in required government spending.  Otherwise, physicians will see reimbursement cuts because seniors require more medical care.  As the typical anesthesiologist knows all-too-well, there is little he or she can do to reduce either the volume or intensity of anesthesia care without risk of severely adverse outcomes.   SGR reform is the only way to right this wrong!

MedPAC, the very entity that Congress created to advise it on physician reimbursement matters, has recommended a positive Medicare physician update for 2006 and replacement of the SGR formula with an index that reflects the actual rise in medical costs, such as the MEI.  This is what Congress needs to do through the budget reconciliation process occurring within the month.   To do less will threaten patient access and only drive many physicians and other Part B providers away from their willingness to treat our nation’s seniors.

 Please act now!  Click here to go to the ASA Legislative Action Center.