This summer, the House Budget Committee established the Health Care Task Force to examine key drivers of our nation’s healthcare spending and solutions to improve health outcomes while bending down the debt curve. As part of this effort, the task force solicited feedback from stakeholders and experts on solutions to improve outcomes, reduce federal healthcare spending in the budget, as well as opportunities to build upon CBO’s ability to project the impact of healthcare policies.
In its response, the The Alliance has described several recommendations below, including:
• Enacting prior authorization reforms to meaningfully address utilization management in the Medicare Advantage program;
• Enacting the Safe Step Act (H.R. 2630);
• Providing an annual inflationary update for Medicare physician payment tied to the Medicare Economic Index (MEI);
• Ensuring that the Quality Payment Program (QPP) offers physicians more clinically relevant participation pathways;
• Taking steps to minimize the complexity, streamline and reduce the reporting burdens of the QPP;
• Ensuring that specialists have a meaningful role in new and/or existing Alternative Payment Models (APMs) and do not face barriers to participation;
• Recognizing that specialists provide procedures and services that save both lives and costs. Prevention is not just for primary care;
• Addressing overpayments to Medicare Advantage plans; and
• Ensuring that Medicare denials and overpayment recoupments are proper by requiring that a physician practicing in the same specialty or sub-specialty and with clinical expertise or knowledge of the service in question reviews the denials.
The complete response to the Budget Committee is available by clicking the link below.
Alliance Response to House Budget RFI on Healthcare Spending
