Tag: Medicare

The Alliance urges it’s members to get involved in federal advocacy given a recent announcement in the NAHC Report. The US House of Representatives has recently released a draft health care reform bill that would cut the Medicare home health benefit by $51 billion over 10 years. Read the pared down and edited except from NAHC Report below to see what you can do.

The message to bring to lawmakers is, “I support the goal of health care for all. However, the goal should not come at the expense of frail elderly and disabled homebound Medicare beneficiaries receiving home health services. Home health services preserve independence, keep families together, and save Medicare dollars by keeping Medicare beneficiaries out of hospitals and nursing homes. Please oppose the proposal to cut home health care.”

A. Calling Members of Congress. You can communicate your concerns to their staff in local or Washington, D.C. offices by phone. When calling, ask the receptionist to connect you with the staffer who handles Medicare issues. To find out the name of your representative, click here.

Continue reading “NAHC Calls on Agencies to Act, Oppose Cuts”

US Representative Mike Capuano is the latest from the state’s Congressional delegation to sign onto letters that oppose damaging cuts to home health. Check the Alliance’s advocacy page under “contact your legislator” to send a message to urge legislators to sign on to Congressman Jim McGovern’s “dear colleague” letters in support of home-based services.

For more information, see the text from a letter the Alliance sent to all Massachusetts Congressman below:

On behalf of Home Care Alliance of Massachusetts, I urge you to sign on to a pair of initiatives championed by your colleagues James McGovern and Walter Jones that opposes home health care cuts in the President’s budget and establishes a House Home Health Working Group.

Home-based services promote independent living for seniors and other individuals in need of care, which help them to remain in their communities where they are most comfortable and familiar. These services are cost-effective in keeping patients out of the hospital and nursing homes. At an economically challenging juncture when home health rates are being frozen and reduced in Massachusetts on the state level, we need to encourage and expand the utilization of home-based care rather than make damaging cuts.

The Working Group will look to further the role of home health in our nation’s health care delivery system while the McGovern-Jones “dear colleague” letter – addressed to the Committee on Ways & Means – resists the President’s proposal to cut Medicare home health payments by $13.16 billion over the next five years. If the President’s proposal is allowed to pass, Massachusetts would lose $16.7 million in Medicare reimbursement for fiscal year 2010 alone. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) report may have uncovered sporadic fraud in home health, but a better approach to controlling Medicare home health spending is to prosecute and punish the few agencies responsible for that fraud instead of reducing rates.

Return to www.thinkhomecare.org.