President Bush passed the latest rendition of an Iraq spending bill, offering some relief to nursing home providers.

The bill, which Bush approved on Friday, delays for one year a rule by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services that would cut about $3.8 billion from Medicaid over five years. The rule will curb what the government perceives as abusive intergovernmental transfers.

Also welcome news for nursing homes is the two-year extension of SeniorCare, a Wisconsin prescription drug program for low-income seniors in the state. The president vetoed a previous version of the war spending bill because it included a timetable for withdrawing troops from Iraq.