Industry advocates are urging stakeholders to keep fighting for the 75/25 Medicare reimbursement relief rate after learning the rate won’t be included in appropriations legislation that needs to be passed by March 22.
“Our lobbyists and HME advocates continue to make the case for the importance of extending Medicare 75/25 reimbursement relief on Capitol Hill while also gathering intelligence on the state of health-care legislative deliberations,” the American Association for Homecare (AAHomecare) said in a March 18 news announcement.
AAHomecare said that after the 75/25 rate was excluded from earlier March government funding packages, industry advocates had been working to get the relief rate included in another healthcare package “with a range of measures that weren’t included in recently passed appropriations legislation.”
“But over the weekend, our lobbyists learned that this separate healthcare package won’t be moving forward at this time,” the association added.
Nevertheless, AAHomecare urged industry members to keep up conversations about the need for funding relief.
“We will continue to look for other legislative opportunities to move the 75/25 measures forward in the near term,” the association said. “We encourage advocates to continue to reach out to health-care staffers for your senators and representative to let them know this is still an important priority and ask for their support in making sure Congressional leaders understand this.”
AAHomecare added that when communicating with Congress, HME suppliers who have had their cash flows and claims payments affected by the February cyberattack on Change Healthcare “can note that the current lowered reimbursement rates and narrow (or negative) margins have made it even harder to withstand shocks like this one.” AAHomecare has set up an advocacy page to facilitate reaching out to legislators about the 75/25 rate.
The association will present its annual AAHomecare Update at Medtrade on March 27 in Dallas, starting at 2:15 p.m.
