March 15, 2023: MGMA and partner healthcare organizations share feedback on MedPAC's March 2023 report

March 15, 2023
 

The Honorable Kevin McCarthy	The Honorable Hakeem Jeffries
Speaker	Minority Leader
United States House of Representatives	United States House of Representatives
Washington, DC 20515	Washington, DC 20515

 

The Honorable Charles Schumer	The Honorable Mitch McConnell
Majority Leader	Minority Leader
United States Senate	United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510	Washington, DC 20510

Dear Speaker McCarthy, Majority Leader Schumer, Minority Leader McConnell, and Minority Leader Jeffries:

On behalf of the American Medical Association (AMA) and the undersigned organizations representing the vast majority of physicians practicing in the United States, we urge Congress to provide physicians with much needed fiscal stability by passing legislation that provides an annual inflation-based payment update based on the full Medicare Economic Index (MEI). This inflation-based update is the principal legislative solution to the ongoing problems plaguing the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MFS).

The undersigned organizations, representing more than 900,000 physicians caring for tens of millions of Medicare beneficiaries, thank Congress for stepping in to ameliorate threats to Medicare physician payment over the last few years triggered by coding changes and the statutory budget neutrality requirement affecting the MFS. Unfortunately, even with these stopgap measures, physicians continue to see their Medicare payments decrease amidst record-setting inflation and rising practice costs, underscoring the need for permanent solutions. We commend Representatives Bera, Bucshon, Schrier, Burgess, Blumenauer, Wenstrup, Schneider, and Miller-Meeks for recognizing this critical need and formally soliciting information on how to stabilize Medicare physician payments late last year.

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