Commission Recommendations
MedPAC makes recommendations to the Congress and to the Secretary of Health and Human Services on issues affecting the administration of the Medicare program. With its recommendations, the Commission strives to improve the delivery of care, while ensuring financial stability and maximizing value for the program. After extensive analysis and evaluation, our recommendations are discussed and voted on by Commissioners in our public meetings. Recommendations are typically published in two main reports, released in March and June of each year.
| Recommendations | Topic(s) | Date |
|---|---|---|
Outpatient dialysis servicesThe Congress should maintain current law and update the composite rate in calendar year 2010 by 1 percent. |
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February 2009 |
Physician services and ambulatory surgical centers (1)The Congress should update payments for physician services in 2010 by 1.1 percent. |
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February 2009 |
Physician services and ambulatory surgical centers (2)The Congress should establish a budget-neutral payment adjustment for primary care services billed under the physician fee schedule and furnished by primary-care-focused practitioners. Primary-care-focused practitioners are those whose specialty designation is defined as primary care and/or those whose pattern of claims meets a minimum threshold of furnishing primary care services. The Secretary would use rulemaking… Read more » |
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February 2009 |
Physician services and ambulatory surgical centers (3)The Congress should direct the Secretary to increase the equipment use standard for expensive imaging machines from 25 hours to 45 hours per week. This change should redistribute relative value units from expensive imaging to other physician services. |
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February 2009 |
Physician services and ambulatory surgical centers (4)The Congress should increase payments for ambulatory surgical center (ASC) services in calendar year 2010 by 0.6 percent. In addition, the Congress should require ASCs to submit to the Secretary cost data and quality data that will allow for an effective evaluation of the adequacy of ASC payment rates. |
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February 2009 |
Public reporting of physicians’ financial relationships (1)The Congress should require all manufacturers and distributors of drugs, biologicals, medical devices, and medical supplies (and their subsidiaries) to report to the Secretary their financial relationships with: * Physicians, physician groups, and other prescribers; * Pharmacies and pharmacists; * Health plans, pharmacy benefit managers, and their employees; * Hospitals and medical schools; * Organizations… Read more » |
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February 2009 |
Public reporting of physicians’ financial relationships (2)The Congress should direct the Secretary to post the information submitted by manufacturers on a public website in a format that is searchable by: * Manufacturer; * Recipient’s name, location, and specialty (if applicable); * Type of payment; * Name of the related drug or device (if applicable); and * Year. |
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February 2009 |
Public reporting of physicians’ financial relationships (3)The Congress should require manufacturers and distributors of drugs to report to the Secretary the following information about drug samples: * Each recipient’s name and business address; * The name, dosage, and number of units of each sample; and * The date of distribution. The Secretary should make this information available through data use agreements. |
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February 2009 |
Public reporting of physicians’ financial relationships (4)The Congress should require all hospitals and other entities that bill Medicare for services to annually report the ownership share of each physician who directly or indirectly owns an interest in the entity (excluding publicly traded corporations). The Secretary should post this information on a searchable public website. |
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February 2009 |
Public reporting of physicians’ financial relationships (5)The Congress should require the Secretary to submit a report, based on the Disclosure of Financial Relationships Report, on the types and prevalence of financial arrangements between hospitals and physicians. |
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February 2009 |