No sooner did hospitals in western Pennsylvania breathe a sigh of relief over escaping the worst possible scenarios in the fiscal cliff crisis than they looked ahead and saw the fiscal cliff sequel:  March 1, when all Medicare payments will be cut two percent unless Congress acts to prevent that reduction.
With Medicare accounting for 40 percent, 50 percent, and even 60 percent of revenue in some western Pennsylvania hospitals, providers are concerned about the impact the two percent sequester could have on their overall financial health.
Such a loss would be especially hard to bear for the area’s safety-net hospitals, which typically have fewer insured patients than other hospitals and therefore are more dependent on their Medicare revenue.
Learn more about why western Pennsylvania hospitals are concerned about March 1 in this Pittsburgh Business Times article.