Commission Recommendations
MedPAC makes recommendations to the Congress and to the Secretary of Health and Human Services on issues affecting the administration of the Medicare program. With its recommendations, the Commission strives to improve the delivery of care, while ensuring financial stability and maximizing value for the program. After extensive analysis and evaluation, our recommendations are discussed and voted on by Commissioners in our public meetings. Recommendations are typically published in two main reports, released in March and June of each year.
| Recommendations | Topic(s) | Date |
|---|---|---|
The Medicare Advantage program (D)The Congress should remove the effect of payments for indirect medical education from the Medicare Advantage plan benchmarks. |
|
June 2005 |
Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (1)The Congress should increase payment rates for the inpatient prospective payment system by the projected increase in the hospital market basket index less 0.4 percent for fiscal year 2006. |
|
March 2005 |
Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (2)The Congress should increase payment rates for the outpatient prospective payment system by the project increase in the hospital market basket index less 0.4 percent for calendar year 2006. |
|
March 2005 |
Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (3)The Congress should extend hold-harmless payments under the outpatient prospective payment system for rural sole community hospitals and other rural hospitals with 100 or fewer beds through calendar year 2006. |
|
March 2005 |
Strategies to improve care: Pay for performance and information technology (A)The Congress should establish a quality incentive payment policy for hospitals in Medicare. |
|
March 2005 |
Strategies to improve care: Pay for performance and information technology (B)CMS should require hospitals to identify which secondary diagnoses were present on admission on their claims forms. |
|
March 2005 |
Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (1)The Congress should increase payment rates for the inpatient prospective payment system by the projected rate of increase in the hospital market basket index for fiscal year 2005. |
|
February 2004 |
Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (2)The Congress should increase payment rates for the outpatient prospective payment system by the projected rate of increase in the hospital market basket index for calendar year 2005. |
|
February 2004 |
Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (3)The Congress should eliminate the outlier policy under the outpatient prospective payment system. |
|
February 2004 |
Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (1)The Secretary should add 13 DRGs to the post-acute transfer policy in fiscal year 2004 and then evaluate the effects on hospitals and beneficiaries before proposing further expansions. |
|
February 2003 |