Physician members of Congress propose extending temporary 3.75% Medicare pay bump through 2022
Physician members of the House of Representatives have introduced bipartisan legislation to extend the temporary 3.75% Medicare pay bump through 2022.
Congress first enacted the increase in late 2020, injecting $3 billion into the physician fee schedule to offset reimbursement reductions for radiologists and other specialists. The change is now slated to expire at the end of 2021. But Reps. Ami Bera, MD, D-Calif., and Larry Bucshon, MD, R-Ind., have now introduced the Supporting Medicare Providers Act of 2021 to extend it another year.
“Beginning on January 1, 2022, many specialists, therapists and other physicians will be faced with substantial reimbursement cuts—up to 9 percent for many providers, if Congress does not act,” Bucshon said in a Nov. 19 statement. “These cuts would make our nation’s doctors work longer hours for less pay during the worst global health crisis of our generation.”
The two physicians recently led a letter-writing campaign against the pay cuts, garnering support from more than 245 colleagues in the House. Following its introduction on Thursday, Nov. 18, House Resolution 6020 was referred to the committees on Energy & Commerce and Ways & Means for further review. Physician groups including the American Medical Association, American College of Surgeons, Medical Group Management Association, and American College of Physicians voiced their support for the bill Friday. The American College of Radiology has also advocated for extending the 3.75% pay increase, but recently expressed concern that Congress is running out of time in 2021.
“Physicians who have faithfully served on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic and put their lives and their families at risk are exhausted,” California Medical Association President Robert Wailes, MD, said in the same statement issued by Bera and Bucshon. “The viability of our practices [has] suffered and we are not out of the woods yet. This bill will help to stabilize physician practices so that we can continue to care for our patients.”
Marty Stempniak has covered healthcare since 2012, with his byline appearing in the American Hospital Association's member magazine, Modern Healthcare and McKnight's. Prior to that, he wrote about village government and local business for his hometown newspaper in Oak Park, Illinois. He won a Peter Lisagor and Gold EXCEL awards in 2017 for his coverage of the opioid epidemic.