Pennsylvania safety-net hospitals Archives - Page 18 of 20 - Safety-Net Association of Pennsylvania

Feds Offer New Carrot to Promote Medicaid Expansion

In their desire to persuade states to expand their Medicaid programs as called for in the Affordable Care Act, federal officials are now suggesting that states could use new federal Medicaid funds to enable Medicaid-eligible people to purchase private insurance.
Even though this was not envisioned in the health reform law, the prospect of making greater use of the private sector appears to be appealing to many Republican governors who have otherwise been reluctant to commit their states to expanding their Medicaid programs.
Pennsylvania has no current plans to expand Medicaid eligibility, although there appears to be growing interest in doing so throughout the state. Expansion would add approximately 500,000 people to the state’s Medicaid rolls, many of whom would be served by safety-net hospitals. The Safety-Net Association of Pennsylvania (SNAP) supports Medicaid expansion in the commonwealth.
Read more about how this idea came about, why many states find it appealing, how it would work, and what the potential challenges are in this New York Times article .

PA Safety Net Admin2013-03-27T06:00:31+00:00March 27th, 2013|Health care reform, Safety-Net Association of Pennsylvania|Comments Off

Immigrants Muddy Reform Calculus for Safety-Net Hospitals

Immigrants to the U.S. – legal and not – pose a special challenge in the health care environment of the future.
Legal immigrants will not be able to benefit from many of the Affordable Care Act’s provisions until they have resided in the U.S. for five years while undocumented residents will not benefit from the reform law’s Medicaid expansion at all. Meanwhile, many of these individuals will continue to turn to health care providers, and especially to hospitals, when they are sick or injured.
But is this is a problem? And if it is, how great a problem is it? How many such individuals are there?
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has attempted to answer that question in a new report titled “State Estimates of the Low-Income Uninsured Not Eligible for the ACA Medicaid Expansion.” Among the report’s findings, it notes that

Safety-net health care providers are likely to continue to be key providers for this population after health reform, and the need for safety-net care will not be spread evenly across states. The capacity of safety-net providers to fill this gap will need to be assessed. While all states will need to develop strategies for meeting the health care needs of these adults, the challenges will be particularly difficult for safety-net providers in states with large numbers of immigrants who will not be eligible for Medicaid.

According to the report, about two percent of Pennsylvania’s non-elderly adults are unauthorized or recent legal immigrants; three percent of the state’s low-income, non-elderly adults are unauthorized or recent legal immigrants; and six percent of the state’s low-income, uninsured, non-elderly adults are unauthorized or recent legal immigrants.
Many of these individuals will undoubtedly turn to Pennsylvania’s safety-net hospitals for medical services.
Find the report here .

PA Safety Net Admin2013-03-26T06:00:04+00:00March 26th, 2013|Health care reform|Comments Off

MACPAC Reports to Congress

The Medicaid and CHIP Payment and Access Commission (MACPAC) has issued its March 2013 report to Congress.
The agency, created to advise Congress on Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) issues, offered two recommendations in its report.
First, it recommended that Congress authorize states to implement 12-month eligibility for adults enrolled in Medicaid and children enrolled in CHIP, in much the same manner as they now do for children enrolled in Medicaid.
And second, MACPAC urged Congress to fund permanently Transitional Medical Assistance (TMA), which enables families that become ineligible for Medicaid because they now earn more money than the program’s limit to retain their Medicaid eligibility for several additional months.
The MACPAC report also includes analyses of several issues involving services for dually eligible (Medicare and Medicaid) individuals.
Because Pennsylvania’s safety-net hospitals serve so many Medicaid, CHIP, and dually eligible patients, MACPAC’s recommendations and analyses can be especially important to them.
Find the MACPAC March 2013 report here .

PA Safety Net Admin2013-03-25T06:00:01+00:00March 25th, 2013|Uncategorized|Comments Off

DSH Losses Will Hurt Safety-Net Hospitals

Safety-net and other hospitals will suffer financially when Affordable Care Act-mandated cuts in Medicare disproportionate share hospital payments (Medicare DSH) and Medicaid DSH payments begin taking effect in FY 2014.
So concludes Moody’s, the bond-rating agency.
The losses will be especially harmful to hospitals in states that do not expand their Medicaid programs and to safety-net hospitals, Moody’s believes.
Currently, Pennsylvania has no plans to expand its Medicaid program as envisioned by the Affordable Care Act.
Hospitals face other specific challenges as well as a result of these cuts.
Read more about Moody’s assessment of the impact of future Medicare DSH and Medicaid DSH cuts in this report in Becker’s Hospital Review.

PA Safety Net Admin2013-03-20T06:00:57+00:00March 20th, 2013|Health care reform|Comments Off

Bill Would Create New Residency Positions

A new bill before Congress would create 15,000 new Medicare-sponsored medical residency spots – the first such new positions in 15 years.
Half of those slots would be for physicians training for careers in primary care.
The bill, which has bipartisan sponsorship, would cost between $9 billion and $10 billion over the next 10 years.
Medical residents play a major role in caring for low-income and uninsured patients in many Pennsylvania safety-net hospitals.
Read more about the possibility of new medical residency slots in this article from The Hill.

PA Safety Net Admin2013-03-18T06:00:44+00:00March 18th, 2013|Uncategorized|Comments Off

PA Officials Estimate Sequestration’s Impact

Now that federal budget sequestration has taken effect, Pennsylvania state officials are busy calculating its potential effects on various health-related state activities.
As part of planning for sequestration, officials have developed estimates in a wide variety of areas, including cuts in substance abuse programs, meals for low-income seniors, food programs, immunizations, AIDS/HIV screenings, medical tests for women and children, and more. They also are looking at how much Pennsylvania health care organizations will lose in research funding and how many jobs might be lost across the state as a result of significant reductions in federal spending under sequestration.
For Pennsylvania’s safety-net hospitals, the biggest problem will be a two percent cut in all Medicare payments.
For a closer look at the anticipated impact of sequestration on these and other aspects of health care spending in Pennsylvania, see this article in the Pittsburgh Business Times.

PA Safety Net Admin2013-03-04T06:00:17+00:00March 4th, 2013|Uncategorized|Comments Off

States Can Cut Medicaid Payments, Administration Says

States are free to reduce payments to providers to keep down their Medicaid costs, the Obama administration has told a court considering a challenge to a 10 percent cut in provider payments by California’s Medicaid program.
The administration weighed in on this subject in a legal brief submitted in a court case that will decide whether California can reduce its Medicaid payments to providers.
If California’s defense of its Medicaid payment cuts proves successful, it could provide a blueprint for other states to reduce payments at a time when most states are preparing for a significant expansion of their Medicaid rolls. Many states are already concerned about the potential for rising Medicaid costs while others have opted out of Medicaid expansion or are still undecided, typically citing the potential for growing costs as the primary reason for their reluctance to expand their Medicaid programs as envisioned under the Affordable Care Act.
Any movement toward reducing Medicaid payments to providers would be extremely harmful to Pennsylvania’s safety-net hospitals, which already suffer from inadequate payments that fail to cover the cost of the care they provide to the state’s 2.1 million Medicaid recipients.
To learn more about the California case and its potential implications elsewhere, see this New York Times article .

PA Safety Net Admin2013-02-28T06:00:15+00:00February 28th, 2013|Pennsylvania Medicaid policy|Comments Off

Sequestration Could Hit Southeastern PA Hospitals Hard

Hospitals in southeastern Pennsylvania could lose $50 million in patient revenue a year if the scheduled sequestration of federal spending takes effect on March 1.
At that time, all Medicare payments to hospitals would be cut two percent.
In addition, hospitals in that region could lose another $41 million from a comparable cut in National Institutes of Health (NIH) spending.
Safety-net hospitals located in southeastern Pennsylvania would suffer a significant proportion of both of these cuts. Members of the Safety-Net Association of Pennsylvania (SNAP) located in this region include the Albert Einstein Medical Center, Hahnemann University Hospital, the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Hospital, Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children, The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, and Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.
To learn more about how sequestration could affect one group of Pennsylvania safety-net hospitals, see this Philadelphia Inquirer article .

PA Safety Net Admin2013-02-27T06:00:15+00:00February 27th, 2013|Safety-Net Association of Pennsylvania|Comments Off

Greater Cost-Sharing in Medicaid’s Future?

States would be permitted to require greater cost-sharing from Medicaid recipients under a new regulation proposed by the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).
The proposed regulation, which also addresses matters involving state Children’s Health Insurance Programs (CHIP) and health insurance exchanges, would permit states to impose increased co-pays for non-emergency use of hospital emergency rooms and for non-preferred prescription drugs. The cost-sharing for non-emergency use of emergency rooms would be limited to eight dollars for Medicaid recipients with incomes between 100 percent to 150 percent of the federal poverty level but would have no limit for those whose income is beyond 150 percent of the federal poverty level.
Cost-sharing requirements of low-income patients pose a particular challenge for Pennsylvania’s safety-net hospitals. Many of their Medicaid patients cannot afford larger co-payments and often leave the hospital without paying them, thereby increasing hospitals’ bad debt.
Interested parties have until February 13 to submit comments to CMS about the proposed regulation.
Read a CMS fact sheet on the proposed regulation and find a link to the regulation itself here , on the CMS web site.

PA Safety Net Admin2013-01-15T12:25:35+00:00January 15th, 2013|Uncategorized|Comments Off

Western PA Hospitals Worry About Fiscal Cliff, Part 2

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 .

PA Safety Net Admin2013-01-09T06:00:09+00:00January 9th, 2013|Uncategorized|Comments Off

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