Nursing homes squeezed by Medicare cuts

[Better Believe It]

Nursing homes squeezed by Medicare cuts
Expect nursing homes to respond by cutting staff. Some may decline to accept patients with more complex medical needs.
By MSN Money
August 8, 2011

The nation's nursing homes are facing a $4 billion drop in annual payments from Medicare. The cuts affect reimbursement fees for what's known as "post-acute care" for seniors at skilled nursing facilities.

Such services are needed by seniors who have been hospitalized and require rehabilitative services before returning to their own homes. Medicare does not cover long-term nursing home stays.

The extensive wrangling and possible impact of these relatively small cuts provide a preview of the brutal fights that would take place in any efforts to reduce the nation's huge federal deficits. They are projected at more than $1.3 trillion this year and $1.1 trillion for the year beginning this October -- several hundred times the size of the nursing home reimbursement cuts.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) finalized the nursing home action in late July. They take effect Oct. 1. The stock prices of several publicly traded nursing home chains plunged immediately and the industry reacted with strong protests. Some home operators said they would need to cut expenses because of the 11% payment reduction.

Read the full article at:

http://money.msn.com/retirement/article.aspx?post=a6d41859-804e-49f4-9568-e4cf43be63b3>1=33013

[dtexdem]

1. Death panels are alive and well.

And largely stocked by Repukes.

[Hubert Flottz]

2. Old sick people don't write those big campaign checks...

so they lose again.

[alc]

3. that's not what we were promised

Congress said they could cut $500 billion in medicare and not make doc-fix permanent and it wouldn't be a problem because they only needed to cut waste and fraud. When they were asked for details they replied "cut waste and fraud". When asked for more details they said "there is a lot of waste and fraud in the system and we will cut it". When asked why, if there is that much waste and fraud, hadn't they already started cutting it they said "next question?"

I don't even know if these cuts are part of health insurance reform or just "normal".

[Donnachaidh]

4. "oh but no seniors will be effected by cuts"

uhh huh.... riiiiighhtt... :eyes:

[Karmadillo]

5. This is insane. Better to tax the rich, end the wars, cut the defense budget 75%.

nt