North Texas hospitals blast Medicaid cuts

[w8liftinglady]

http://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/news/2011/03/29/north-texas-hospitals-blast-medicaid.html


Proposed Medicaid cuts threaten to overload North Texas hospitals with uninsured patients, hospital officials said at a press conference Tuesday in Irving.

The 75 hospitals making up the Dallas-Fort Worth Hospital Council shared their concerns about state budget reductions to hospitals and physicians after the release of the House Appropriations Committee’s House Bill 1 last week. Representatives of Baylor Health Care System, HCA North Texas, JPS Health Network, Methodist Health System, Parkland Health and Hospital System and Texas Health Resources called on legislators to protect state funding.

The proposed cuts will cause a loss of federal matching dollars and more uncompensated care for hospitals and physicians, W. Stephen Love, president and CEO of the council, said in an interview with the Dallas Business Journal before the press conference.

"If the cuts impact physicians, it is going to be a problem," Love said. "Approximately one-third of the physicians currently take Medicaid. If you have a reduction in physician payments, many more physicians will not take Medicaid, thus the primary care physicians won't be treating them and they're going to be in the emergency room even more than they are now."

[napi21]

1. So where's the hospital & AMA lobbiests now? They're

supposed to be strong eough to be able to stop congress from doing that!

[w8liftinglady]

2. excellent question..I should add- we are having a harder time finding

Medicare-accepting physicians as well.

Universal health care would be so intelligent for everyone but the insurance and pharmaceutical companies.

[RKP5637]

3. These guys really think they're solving the healthcare problems, don't they. Push the

cost off onto someone else, problem solved. The damn politicians don't solve problems anymore to make for a better country, all they do is angle how they can push if off on someone else and take credit. The BS runs deep.

[napi21]

4. They're not TRYING to solve any problems! They're trying to get

re-elected! That's all! Whoever it hurts doesn't matter tp them.

[RKP5637]

5. It's all in the final count, isn't it ... doing what they can to get the most $$$ in

contributions and the most votes. No wonder the system is F'ed up.

[matt819]

6. Tough

Your fellow Texans are partly responsible for this. As long as you and your kind keep voting against your own interests, this is what's going to happen. We're seeing it all over - Wisconsi, Floria, Maine, etc.