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) | Publication |
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Ambulatory surgical center services (2)The Congress should eliminate the update to payment rates for ASC services for fiscal year 2004. |
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Ambulatory surgical center services (3)Until the Secretary implements a revised ASC payment system, the Congress should ensure that payment rates for ASC procedures do not exceed hospital outpatient PPS rates for those procedures, after accounting for differences in the bundle of services covered. |
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Outpatient dialysis servicesThe Congress should update the composite rate payment by the projected change in input prices, less 0.9 percent, for calendar year 2004. |
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Hospital inpatient and outpatient services (3)For calendar year 2003, the Secretary should increase the payment rates for services covered by the outpatient prospective payment system by the rate of increase in the hospital market basket |
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Outpatient dialysis servicesFor calendar year 2003, the Congress should update the composite rate payment for outpatient dialysis services by 2.4 percent. |
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End-stage renal disease payment policies in traditional Medicare (A)The Congress should instruct the Secretary to broaden the composite rate payment bundle to include widely used services currently excluded from it. The Secretary should continue to emphasize quality monitoring and quality improvement efforts to ensure that patients have access to high-quality dialysis care. |
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End-stage renal disease payment policies in traditional Medicare (B)The Congress should instruct the Secretary to evaluate whether the composite rate’s unit of payment- a single dialysis session- should be revised to reflect better the way dialysis is furnished. |
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End-stage renal disease payment policies in traditional Medicare (C)The Congress should instruct the Secretary to revise the outpatient dialysis payment system to account for factors that affect providers’ costs to deliver high-quality clinical care, including dialysis method, dose, frequency, and patient activity. |
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End-stage renal disease payment policies in traditional Medicare (D)The Congress should instruct the Secretary to develop a wage index based on market wage rates for occupations typically used in furnishing dialysis. |
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End-stage renal disease payment policies in traditional Medicare (E)For calendar year 2002, the composite rate for outpatient dialysis services should remain unchanged. |
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