Members of the state’s congressional delegation are among a bipartisan group of lawmakers calling on Capitol Hill leaders to prevent $8 billion in proposed cuts to safety-net hospitals.
State lawmakers signed off on an emergency rule Thursday that will allow rural hospitals to access a new pot of federal funding. The regulation will allow financially strapped facilities to apply for a Rural Emergency Hospital designation that will open the facilities up to millions of dollars in federal assistance and higher Medicare reimbursement rates.
Hospitals are already feeling the burn. Last year, Atlanta Medical Center closed in Atlanta, leaving Grady Memorial Hospital the only Level 1 trauma center in Atlanta. In Philadelphia, Hahnemann Hospital was shuttered after its parent company, for-profit Tenet Healthcare, no longer found it financially feasible.
The bill, Senate Bill 241, would require Nevada Medicaid to pay the hospitals the cost of the service for outpatient services and administratively flexible “swing beds” for rural hospitals that are designated as Critical Access Hospitals (CAH). Currently, the hospitals are only reimbursed at cost for in-patient services.
Labor costs and trouble with patient discharges again contributed to financial losses at Allina and Fairview, the two largest health systems in the Twin Cities. A first-quarter operating loss of $101.6 million at Allina reflects industry-wide trends that hit the Minneapolis-based health system harder than expected, Chief Financial Officer Ric Magnuson said in an interview.