Mid-sized Iowa hospitals will see a greater Medicare reimbursement this October as a result of a two-year fix that was included in the new health reform law – the Affordable Care Act, Iowa congressmen said Friday afternoon.
Sen. Tom Harkin
Rep. Bruce Braley
As a result, Iowa hospitals will receive $12.5 million in additional Medicare reimbursements, or 8.3 percent of the available funds, according to 1st District Rep. Bruce Braley. Only New York and Virginia will receive more money as part of these negotiations.
The change to aid low-volume hospitals, some of which have struggled to keep their doors open, according to Sen. Tom Harkin, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, was in a final rule released July 30 by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.
“This is great news for our low-volume hospitals and further proof that health reform continues to deliver for states like Iowa,” Harkin said.
“The announcement of these funds is a big step in the right direction to finally rewarding Iowa’s doctors for the care they provide,” Braley said. “For decades, Iowa’s doctors have been punished for no reason other than geography.”
The new rule is a step toward ending geographic disparities and reforming Medicare “so it finally rewards quality of care instead of the quantity of procedures performed,” Braley said.
The health reform legislation approved by Congress will “ensure every Iowan access to quality healthcare, which these community hospitals provide,” he said. “No hospital should be penalized simply because of its size and location and I am encouraged that our reform law fixed that concern for Iowa’s mid-sized hospitals.”
Under the current Medicare structure, payment rates for hospitals do not account for the fact that most rural facilities cannot achieve the same economies of scale as large hospitals, Harkin said. These “tweener” hospitals face inadequate reimbursement, which threatens the care many seniors can receive in their area.
Iowa’s rural hospitals that will benefit from this adjustment include: St. Anthony Regional Hospital in Carroll, Fort Madison Community Hospital, Grinnell Regional Medical Center, Keokuk Area Hospital, Unity HealthCare in Muscatine, Skiff Medical Center in Newton, Spencer Hospital and Lakes Regional Healthcare in Spirit Lake.
