COUNTDOWN TOWARDS SPENDING DEAL.
- PUSH TOWARDS A GOVERNMENT SPENDING BILL. Over the next 12 days, the push in Washington, DC, will be to fund the government. Funding for the federal government is set to expire on December 11, along with the healthcare extenders (e.g., funding for community health centers, delaying the Medicaid Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) reductions, and funding for other public health programs). There are positive signs that a government spending package will move forward. However, there is always the possibility in Washington, DC, and in the year 2020, for things to go off track.
- WHAT ELSE IS ON THE TABLE? After a government spending package, there are the other policies that Congress can agree to. Issues on the table include COVID-19 relief, surprise billing, maternal healthcare policies, and Medicare payment policy. There is room for compromise in each of these areas. These policies do not have the same hard deadline as government funding and could slip to the following week (December 18) if a deal is to be reached. Either way, it is a tight timeline for Congress to accomplish all these priorities, so we watch for which ones raise to the top.
- REGULATIONS COMING SOON. We are also anxiously awaiting the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to publish the Physician Fee Schedule and Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System final rules. We anticipate that these rules will be coming very soon. In fact, the Physician Fee Schedule final rule is currently under Office of Management and Budget review. What is unclear is how similar the rules look to the proposed rules that were published earlier this year.
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