Greater proportions of not-for-profit and government hospitals than for-profit hospitals qualified for at least one category of Medicare payment adjustments last year, according to new findings from the Government Accountability Office.
About 97% of government-owned hospitals and 90% of not-for-profit hospitals paid by the Medicare program received at least one form of increased payment to the standard inpatient prospective-payment system last year.
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Nearly every expert and group that has looked at how to control U.S. medical cost growth says more Americans should fill out advance directives to help reduce costly futile care at the end of life. In 2009, there was some bipartisan support in Congress for having Medicare pay physicians for their time in counseling patients on living wills and end-of-life care. Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.) pushed for inclusion of the provision in the healthcare reform legislation.
But Sarah Palin and other conservatives twisted this into “death panels,” accusing President Barack Obama and the Democrats of trying to throw granny off the cliff. Terrified Democratic sponsors of the reform legislation yanked the provision. But the death panel myth helped fuel the rise of the Tea Party and the Republican takeover of the House in 2010.
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McDermott
Rep. Jim McDermott (D-Wash.) wants to reduce organized medicine's role in setting Medicare fees. But such legislation is likely to face stiff resistance from the American Medical Association and subspecialist physician groups, who are heavily represented in the fee-setting process.
McDermott has introduced legislation that he said will address “the lack of transparency and fairness” in setting the Medicare fee schedule and lessen the CMS' reliance on guidance from the AMA's Specialty Society Relative Value Scale Update Committee—commonly referred to as “the RUC.”
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