The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) is recommending that Congress throw out the Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR) formula currently used in setting Medicare physician payments. Under that formula, physicians are due to have their Medicare payments cut by about 30% on Jan. 1. But while doctors are unanimous in their loathing of the SGR, there are differing opinions about how to solve the problems with how Medicare pays physicians.
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Check out the Policy & Practice podcast to hear how MedPAC wants to pay for its SGR fix and what objections physician groups are raising about the plan. This week’s podcast also features news on the Institute of Medicine’s recommendations on what should be included in an essential package of health insurance benefits for health plans operating in the state health insurance exchanges in 2014.
Join us next week as we follow the deliberations of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction and what it means for Medicare and other health programs.
--- Mary Ellen Schneider (@MaryEllenNY)