A new task force from the US House Budget Committee will look at how to reduce healthcare spending, including ways to modernize healthcare and support access to care.
While nothing the committee or task force has published so far specifically mentions long-term care or Medicaid, the task force appears intent on stopping, or at least slowing, improper payments.
The Health Care Task Force, which will be chaired by Rep. Michael C. Burgess (pictured), MD (R-TX), issued a request for information (RFI) from various stakeholders and experts to weigh in on improving outcomes and reducing federal spending. In an opinion piece published in The Hill last week, Burgess and Budget Committee Chair Jodey Arrington (R-TX) said the task force will be an “incubator” to develop legislation for a more “cost-effective” system.
“We will examine the Congressional Budget Office’s capabilities to forecast the longer-term budgetary impacts of legislation to ensure policymakers are equipped with the best data when crafting solutions,” Burgess and Arrington wrote. “The Task Force will not be searching for cost savings alone. Many Americans are also deeply unhappy with our health care system, and seek more innovative care offering greater personalization, convenience and lower prices.”
The opinion piece referenced a report from the Government Accountability Office that highlighted more than $80 billion in improper spending last year from Medicaid.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced in May that every skilled nursing facility that participates in Medicare will have five Medicare Part A claims audited in an effort to correct confusion related to changes from the Resource Utilization Group (RUG) IV to the Patient Driven Payment Model. The Comprehensive Error Rate Testing (CERT) program projected an improper payment rate of 15.1% for SNF services in 2022, up from 7.79% in 2021.
The reviews started June 5. McKnight’s Long-Term Care News reported last week that so far, the audits have been a “debacle.” A spokeswoman for CMS told McKnight’s on Tuesday that “very few” reviews have been completed and the agency “has received limited feedback.”
In its RFI, the task force asked for recommendations on reducing improper payments in federal health programs. It is also looking at ways to “incorporate innovation” in Medicare and other programs to improve patient outcomes as well as examples of “evidence-based, cost-effective preventive health measures or interventions that can reduce long term health costs.”
“Our task force will convene members from various committees as well as independent experts and stakeholders from across the health care sector to reform what’s broken and build on what’s working,” Burgess and Arrington wrote in their opinion column. They noted that nearly one-third of the federal government’s $6.4 trillion in spending this year will go toward healthcare, which is projected to grow from $1.9 trillion to more than $3.4 trillion by 2033.
