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For further information about NAUH or comments on federal Medicare and Medicaid policy issues, please contact Ellen Kugler, Esq., executive director, at 703-444-0989 or by e-mail at ellen@nauh.org.
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NAUH Urges Congress to Protect Urban Safety-Net Hospitals From Further Medicare Cuts, December 13, 2011.
NAUH shared with the news media its opposition to a provision in a House bill to address the Medicare doc fix. NAUH noted that the reduction in Medicare bad debt reimbursement proposed in H.R. 3630 would fall disproportionately on urban safety-net hospitals because those hospitals care for especially large numbers of low-income, dually eligible (Medicare and Medicaid) seniors who cannot afford their Medicare co-pays and deductibles.
Medicare Deficit-Reduction Cuts Could Be Job Killers, Hospital Group Says, November 10, 2011.
NAUH releases a study that finds that hospitals may lose as many as 87,358 direct jobs because of Medicare disproportionate share (Medicare DSH) and other Medicare spending cuts associated with implementation of the Affordable Care Act and another 46,103 hospital jobs if additional Medicare cuts currently under consideration in Congress – the elimination of Medicare bad debt reimbursement and a 60 percent cut in Medicare indirect medical education payments (Medicare IME) – are adopted.
Health Reform-Mandated Medicare Cuts Would Prove Devastating to Private Urban Safety-Net Hospitals, Study Concludes, January 26, 2011.
NAUH releases a study demonstrating that cuts in future Medicare disproportionate share payments (Medicare DSH) mandated by the Affordable Care Act will cost the typical urban safety-net hospital $8.5 million in lost Medicare revenue in 2014 and more than $53 million through 2019. With more than one-half of all urban safety-net hospitals already losing money, such cuts could eventually jeopardize access to care in urban areas across the country. Cuts of this size, NAUH maintains, overestimate the degree to which health care reform will reduce the need for Medicare DSH and Medicaid DSH payments to urban safety-net hospitals.
Latest Health Care Reform Financing Deal Could Devastate Private Urban Safety-Net Hospitals, July 8, 2009.
NAUH criticizes an agreement between the Obama administration, the Senate Finance Committee, and several hospital groups to reduce federal health care spending, especially Medicare disproportionate share (Medicare DSH) and Medicaid DSH payments, to help pay for health care reform. NAUH points out that even with more people insured, urban safety-net hospitals will still need Medicare DSH and Medicaid DSH revenue to care for their many low-income patients and those who remain uninsured despite reform.
Administration's Latest Health Reform Financing Proposal Would Hurt Private Urban Safety-Net Hospitals, June 16, 2009.
NAUH expresses its opposition to an Obama administration proposal to reduce Medicare disproportionate share (Medicare DSH) and Medicaid DSH payments to hospitals by 75 percent over the next 10 years. These payments help compensate hospitals for the inability of their low-income elderly patients to pay their Medicare co-pays and deductibles and help reduce the impact of state Medicaid programs that typically reimburse hospitals less than the cost of the care they provide to their Medicaid patients. NAUH maintains that the need for these subsidies will not disappear when reform enables many more Americans to obtain health insurance.

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