Medicare cuts payments to nursing homes: Just the start.

[Better Believe It]

And the budget cutting bill hasn't even been passed by Congress yet! BBI



Medicare cuts payments to nursing homes
By Sam Baker
July 29, 2011

Nursing homes will see a double-digit drop in their Medicare payments next year.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) on Friday finalized an 11 percent cut in payments to nursing homes. CMS proposed the cut in April, saying Medicare made unexpected extra payments under a new classification system and that a cut is needed in order to recapture that money.

The American Health Care Association, which represents nursing homes, said the cut endangers thousands of jobs as well as the quality of nursing-home care.

"This will threaten our ability to provide quality care to America’s seniors ... At such a critical time, while we already face drastic cuts to Medicaid at the state level and a fragile economic recovery, this was unnecessary," AHCA President Mark Parkinson said in a statement. The 11 percent payment cut will amount to roughly $3.8 billion, CMS said.

Read the full article at:

http://thehill.com/blogs/healthwatch/medicare/174439-medicare-cuts-payments-to-nursing-homes

[Donnachaidh]

1. but but but -- only the providers will feel the pain, right?

:sarcasm:

:puke:

[durablend]

2. Yup, and they'll GLADLY take it in the shorts

Just so they can keep helping people.

Uh huh...

:sarcasm:

[peacebird]

4. those old people should just die already, out of patriotism! - sarcasm -

[Pigheaded]

26. Nursing homes ARE providers NT

[sasha031]

3. oh ya, that will be the beginning

the real death panels

reading the comments on the article, hey are blaming Obama and the Dems for this.

[readmoreoften]

5. But will you support Obama when he invokes the 14th? Which he'll never do because

He's getting what he wants already.

[dgibby]

8. I'd support him on the 14th in a NY minute. n/t

[dgibby]

6. Well, so much for job creation.

Layoffs to follow in 5...4...3....2...1....

[aquart]

7. Double Digit Dead Grannies!

For real.

[Horse with no Name]

9. Exactly. The trickle--down theory that REALLY works

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1618513

[michaz]

10. If this is true, there could be an added expense to the families who will have to help

with the non-covered expenses. So all that talk about not wanting to leave all this debt to their children only means the children of those in nursing homes will have it put on them now.

[DesertFlower]

14. exactly. nt

[CountAllVotes]

17. yep

It was bad enough when my late mother was DX'd with cancer. Being she was going to die, they called in hospice and I was told to find somewhere to put here until she died. Luckily, I found a place for her to die. She was there for the last 2-1/2 months of her life. :(
Had it been longer, it could have been paid for for awhile longer.
However, Medicare did not cover this expense being she was on hospice care.
In any event, had she lasted a long time, it would have swallowed up everything she had left in life -- all she had worked for in her lifetime.
The bill was paid out of her estate so she paid for it.
If she did not have the money, I don't know what would have happened as I had no way to pay out a few thousand $ a months for any length of time.

She was a retired Federal employee btw. Some much for that crock of B.S. re: the fantastic benefits huh?

:kick:

[DURHAM D]

21. This appears to only be about Medicaid patients. nt

[EFerrari]

11. Somebody tell CMS it's all DU speculation, quick. n/t

[banned from Kos]

12. The Hill says this "cut" is a payment adjustment for prior overpayments

"Medicare made unexpected extra payments under a new classification system and that a cut is needed in order to recapture that money."


Must be tough to read a short article for some.

[Horse with no Name]

15. And these cuts aren't going to be permanent?

If Medicare was able or willing to recoup the money from those that were "overpaid", don't you imagine they would?

Seriously? Do you have ANY idea how things actually work?

[banned from Kos]

18. It didn't say the reimbursement rate had changed - just that an overpayment had

occurred. The "new system" gets the blame. This is fairly common. I worked as a business apps consultant for Oracle so believe me, I know about implementation errors.

[mzmolly]

24. Please do not disturb the

fact challenged frenzy.

[Shandris]

13. Thereby guaranteeing that anyone with a sudden, catastrophic need to put...

....grandma in the nursing home will have to put the house up for sale quick before it drains their finances completely, thus giving banks quicker (and cheaper) buy-ins to entire communities over time. Communities they can sell to the rich motherfuckers who won't have to worry one whit about this.

Transfer of property by fiat. The real goal of Capitalism since the founding of Jamestown.

[fivepennies]

16. Old aristocrats never die, they just

"Transfer property by fiat. The real goal of Capitalism since the founding of Jamestown."

How many hundreds of more years might it take before people GET that simple fact?

[Urban Prairie]

19. Unexpected extra payments, huh?

So who the hell was responsible for that nearly 4 billion fuckup?

A software programmer?

A "glitch" in calculating payments?

So who really benefitted from those extra payments, the caregivers, or the patients that they were in charge of?

Both?

Were more caregivers hired, and/or were there some improvements made in actual caregiving, like maybe shiny new metal bedpans and newer/cleaner/higher threadcount bedding as a result of that unexpected "windfall", or not?

Of course it will be the most vulnerable and frail and ill of US citizens who will, once again, suffer in neglect and silence from either stupidity, greed, or mistakes being made, but news like this will not get any more than at best, perhaps a cursory mention in the media, b/c it is much more important to let us know about, for example, the new $30,000.00 designer purse, scarf, pumps and matching dress looks like, on one of the current "it" girl Kardashians who bought them at a designer boutique on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. After all, she is another one of those much more important and wealthy "job-creators" whose taxes probably need more cutting.

[Vanje]

20. We'll have lots and lots of time to give Grandma

the best care available, because WE WONT HAVE JOBS!

Sadly, We'll all be living together in Grandma's Buick.

[mzmolly]

22. "Medicare made unexpected extra payments ...

a cut is needed in order to recapture that money." This tid-bit appears important?

Not to mention -

"Also on Friday, CMS announced modest payment increases for hospice and rehabilitation facilities.

Medicare will pay inpatient rehabilitation facilities roughly 2 percent more next year, at a cost of around $150 million. The regulation setting those rates also establishes a new quality-reporting program for rehabilitation facilities.

Hospices will see a 3 percent increase in Medicare payments..."

[Cleita]

23. More homeless old people living in their cars or worse

in a ditch somewhere. Pathetic. Those multi-millionaires who are our rulers don't have a clue.

[OhioChick]

25. K&R n/t

[Lone_Star_Dem]

27. How dare elderly people need nursing home care!

Don't they know we're all supposed to be tightening our belts now?

Sickening.