Doctors Outraged Republican Congress To Allow Medicare Pay Cut

The American Medical Association and a chorus of physician groups decried what they say is a decision by the Republican-controlled Congress to allow a devastating cut in Medicare payments to physicians.

A funding bill released over the weekend by Republicans who control the U.S. House of Representatives will allow to go forward a 2.8% cut in payments physicians receive from the Medicare health insurance program to treat elderly patients.

With Donald Trump and his biggest campaign donor, the billionaire Elon Musk, already cutting federal health agency funding and Republicans looking at cuts to spending on Medicaid coverage for low-income Americans, doctors and hospitals fear the Medicare payment cut to physicians will certainly lead to closures of physician practices, clinics and hospitals, particularly in rural areas.

“Today’s decision to allow the 2.8 percent cut to go forward is particularly devastating for rural and underserved communities,” AMA president Dr. Bruce Scott said Sunday. “These physicians and their patients have borne the brunt of the rising practice costs – 3.5 percent this year according to Medicare’s own estimate. When adjusted for inflation, Medicare payment to physician practices has dropped 33 percent since 2001. Let me be clear: these unsustainable cuts will force more practices to close and leave patients with fewer options for care.”

The decision to allow the cut to go forward was a shock to physician groups and Congressional observers. Less than two weeks ago, the AMA cheered bipartisan legislation to stop the cut plus language in a bill that would provide “a 2% payment update to help offset the rising costs of running a practice,” the AMA said in late February.

The bipartisan legislation to stop the payment cut also had the support of the “House GOP Doctors’ Caucus,” which the AMA said endorsed the improved Medicare funding, calling “the current path forward for physicians – especially those serving rural and underserved communities – (as) unsustainable.”

Politico reported Rep. Greg Murphy, a North Carolina Republican and urologist who co-chairs the GOP Doctors’ Caucus, said “in recent months that Republican leadership was open to including the policy in the bill to keep the government funded through September, and that Trump administration officials had assured it would be addressed.”

“Five health industry lobbyists, granted anonymity to share details of private negotiations, were also anticipating it would be a part of the funding measure to avoid a shutdown after March 14,” Politico’s report said.

But physicians Sunday said Congress has failed them, and it’s Medicare patients who will suffer.

Rural areas are already struggling to attract physicians, doctors say, and studies show Medicare payment makes up most of any rural physician’s revenue. And the payment cuts come as physicians are seeing an influx of patients.

“Physicians across the country are outraged that Congress’s proposed spending package locks in a devastating fifth consecutive year of Medicare cuts, threatening access to care for 66 million Medicare patients,” the AMA’s Scott said. “Despite repeated warnings, lawmakers are once again ignoring the dire consequences of these cuts and their impact both on patients and the private practices struggling to keep their doors open.”