Cuts to Medicare for home health care providers

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Story by Sara Sciammacco, “CNC News”

Lawmakers proposed cutting money from Medicare to pay for the overall health care bill, saying the changes will make it more efficient and help ensure its long-term viability. The House bill takes away $55 billion in payments to the program’s home health care providers, while the Senate bill slices $42 billion over 10 years.

“This scenario could be devastating for older Floridians,” Sen. George Lemieux (R-FL) said.

LeMieux said more than half of Florida’s home health providers will be in the red. The state has more than 800 certified professionals visiting more than 350,000 people who need nursing care or physical therapy.

“We are going to take the smaller home health agencies 1.9 million small businesses and they are not going to be able to function because we are going to take this money out,” Lemieux said.

Many Democrats disagree. They say Medicare providers are being dramatically overpaid and making high profits. Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz (D-FL) took aim at the criticism that seniors care will be significantly affected. 

“Senator Lemieux is just flat wrong. I mean I realize he just got here and maybe his learning curve is a little bigger than he’d like it to be, but seniors will not feel any pain whatsoever when it comes to the services that they get through Medicare that they know and that they are comfortable with now,” Wasserman-Schultz said.

Wasserman-Schultz said many providers will still make a profit under the legislation — just a more reasonable one. She said their operations should remain the same. But some Florida home health care professionals say otherwise.

“We are not an agency that is going to close as a result of the cuts — although there are many agencies that will have to — we’re just going to have to cut back the level of service and the availability of support service to our staff that is going out there to render the care,” said Maxine Hochhauser, the CEO of AllianceCare.

AllianceCare serves seniors across the state. Hochhauser is bracing for a $3 million dollar hit. She said seniors will not have the same access to care if there are fewer people providing it.

Opponents of the cuts fear health care costs will go up. Home health care visits run about $100 to $200, whereas hospital stays can be thousands of dollars.

“I would be less inclined to support the larger measures, many of which are good, if it did not include a robust home health care program,” Rep. Alcee Hastings said. People over 65 make up 12% of Hastings’ district.

Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) said the government needs to go after waste in Medicare. He, like Wasserman-Schultz, said the cuts will not affect services. The Senate hopes to finish a health care bill before the end of the month.

Created by Bureau Chief and Executive Producer Melinda Wittstock, Capitol News Connection from PRI provides insightful, localized coverage of participating stations’ congressional delegations.

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