News Releases

The Center Urges U.S. House Members to Sign on to IPPS Letter to CMS

The Center for Health Affairs this week urged members of the Northeast Ohio delegation to the U.S. House of Representatives to sign on to a letter circulating on the Hill aimed at improving Medicare reimbursement for hospitals.

The bipartisan letter, spearheaded by Reps. Brad Schneider (D-IL) and Carol Miller (R-WV), urges the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to make critical changes to the hospital inpatient prospective payment system (IPPS) proposed rule for fiscal year 2023 to more accurately reflect the cost of providing hospital care to patients.

According to an American Hospital Association (AHA) fact sheet on the proposed rule, the payment updates and policy changes would result in a net decrease in payments to IPPS hospitals in fiscal year (FY) 2023 compared to 2022. CMS’ estimates were produced using historical data that in a steady-state economy may predict with some accuracy the anticipated rate of cost increases to determine provider reimbursements. However, the end of calendar year 2021 into 2022 should not be considered a steady-state economic environment representative of past trends. As a result, the proposed market basket and productivity update will inadequately reimburse hospitals and health systems.

The letter from U.S. House members, along with a separate letter that circulated in the U.S. Senate, encourages CMS to use its “special exceptions and adjustments” authority to make a retrospective adjustment to more fairly account for the difference between the market basket update that was implemented for FY 2022 and the current projected FY 2022 market basket.

A total of 112 members of the House, which included Reps. Shontel Brown, Anthony Gonzalez, Dave Joyce and Tim Ryan from Northeast Ohio, signed the House letter and both Sens. Sherrod Brown and Rob Portman signed the Senate letter.

For more on The Center’s advocacy activities on behalf of member hospitals, contact us.