Analysis of pending health reform bill points to huge cuts in Medicare funding

Aug 26 2009

A new American Health Care Association analysis of the pending House health reform bill when combined with the impact of a recently-enacted Medicare regulation cutting Medicare-funded nursing home care by $12 billion will result in total cuts of $44 billion over ten years. In West Virginia, seniors who require nursing and rehabilitative care will face a total Medicare funding cut of $272 million for those services over that same time period. The study finds that West Virginia’s skilled nursing care community could lose over 300 caregiver jobs under the current House bill.

"The pending health reform bill in the U.S. House of Representatives will significantly undermine West Virginia seniors’ Medicare-funded nursing care, and the long term care community would like to urge lawmakers to revise the proposed bill to ensure that seniors benefit from health care reform," said Jesse Samples, CEO of West Virginia Health Care Association. "Arguments being made that seniors' benefits will not be reduced by the House bill disregard the fact that when Medicare significantly cuts provider reimbursement, then providers are forced to cut staff because labor expenses comprise 70 percent of facility costs. Cutting staff within a facility has a direct, immediate, negative impact on patients and their care - and that is what the current House bill will do. "

The new analysis of the House bill's Medicare funding reductions over ten years, combined with the $12 billion ten year Medicare cuts effective October 1, 2009 by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), is computed by the AHCA Reimbursement and Research Department using the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) score of both HR 3200 and the recent CMS funding rule, along with Medicare Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF) utilization data.