Author: lesmastersonmedia

Originally published on Healthcare Dive.

A movement health systems have been dreading is gaining speed, as commercial and government payers are implementing more and more policies that restrict reimbursements for services that can be performed outside a hospital. Anthem’s recent announcement that it will no longer pay for MRIs and CT scans performed at a hospital in an outpatient basis could be a harbinger for what’s to come.

Several hospitals and health systems have already taken steps to recapture revenue lost to these demands for pushing patients outside their walls whenever possible. But with the industry already suffering from reduced patient volumes and lower reimbursements in general, policies restricting the services hospitals count on for steady cash flow could be a major disruption.

Anthem’s new rule

Anthem plans to implement the policy in 13 of its 14 states by March 2018, with only New Hampshire exempt from the new policy. The payer has already implemented it in nine states.

Hospital officials are predictably concerned about what this could mean to their margins. Higher in-hospital reimbursement for MRIs and CT scans made them profitable, even though they’re not a major service for hospitals. One estimate said some health systems collect more than half of their profit from imaging services.

Anthem’s new policy is part of a payer movement to reduce healthcare costs by pushing patients to get care at locations less expensive than hospitals. That’s also true for another controversial Anthem policy to stop paying for Emergency Department (ED) care it deems unnecessary.

Trying to cut healthcare costs is nothing new for insurance companies, or the industry in general. For many years, payers and employers have created health plans that reward members for getting care at less expensive locations. That benefit design has resulted in patients paying more to go to specialists rather than primary care physicians and going to EDs rather than places like urgent care centers. Payers have also nudged members to get more services as an outpatient and avoid being admitted to a hospital.

Those cost-cutting efforts seem to be working. Altarum’s Center for Sustainable Health Spending’s recent Health Sector Economic Indicators reported overall national health spending growth decreased in the second quarter. A major reason for the slower spending growth was connected to hospital spending growth, which was only 1.3% rather than the expected 4% growth rate. Hospital spending growth was the slowest major healthcare category over the past year. Hospital spending increased in June by 0.8%, which was the slowest growth rate year-over-year since January 1989.

While payers have looked for passive ways to re-direct patient care in the past, Anthem’s two new policies extend beyond benefit design and go to the heart of hospital funding. In recent years, hospitals overcame lower Medicare reimbursements by making more on imaging and ED services, which have been steady profit centers. Now, hospitals in 13 states will see that funding dry up.

Anthem said its new Imaging Clinical Site of Care program dovetails with the Institute for Healthcare Improvement Triple Aim Initiative, which seeks to improve the patient experience, improve population health and reduce per capita cost of healthcare.

Anthem subsidiary AIM Specialty Health is administering the program to identify when hospital outpatient services for services like MRIs and CT scans are medically necessary. Lori McLaughlin, Anthem communications director, told Healthcare Dive getting services in a “clinically appropriate setting” like a freestanding outpatient clinic or imaging center is less expensive and clinical research shows those locations are safe.

Anthem said the policy will result in lower healthcare costs for members and the healthcare industry overall. Imaging services in a hospital can cost $1,000 more than a freestanding clinic, and that cost could fall to the patient if they haven’t met their plan’s deductible.

Anthem said AIM Speciality Health will only review the level of care if there are at least two alternate freestanding imaging centers nearby. So, imaging would be approved in rural areas that might not have more than one option for an MRI or CT scan, according to the payer.

McLaughlin said Anthem doesn’t know how much it has saved or how many hospital scans it has reduced because the plan is still so new. With the imaging policy set, McLaughlin said Anthem will continue to look for more ways to save healthcare costs.

“Anthem’s primary concern is to provide access to quality, safe and affordable healthcare for our affiliated health plan members. We’re always looking at new approaches to ensure clinical quality and improve affordability and we are committed to reducing overall medical cost where possible when the safety of the member is not put at risk,” she said.

Will other payers follow suit?

Anthem is a major insurer in more than a dozen states, so any decision will have a ripple effect in those areas and beyond.

Lea Halim, senior research consultant at Advisory Board, told Healthcare Dive other payers will likely watch how Anthem’s policy plays out.

“Will Anthem get a lot of pushback from patients and employers? Will hospital lobbies succeed in getting state governments to force Anthem to roll back the policy? If Anthem does not face, or successfully overcomes these types of challenges, other payers may very well follow suit,” Halim said.

Payers are working to bring down costs in other ways, too. One example is insurance companies buying surgical centers, said Gregory Hagood, senior managing director at SOLIC Capital Advisors, which works with hospitals on mergers and acquisitions. Another example is payers creating networks that encourage members to use alternative (i.e., less expensive) services.

Hagood expects payers will continue to look for more ways to cut costs, including reviewing elective services performed in hospitals. “We’re seeing all insurance companies trying to create an alternative network where, theoretically, the quality of these centers are what you get in the hospital, but at a lower rate because you don’t have all the overhead of hospitals,” he told Healthcare Dive.

Private companies like Anthem aren’t the only payers creating policies that cut costs and affect hospital finances. The CMS also recently announced a proposal to make costs more site neutral. With this change, CMS would pay services at off-campus hospital outpatient departments by 25% of regular outpatient rates (while increasing outpatient payments overall by 1.75%). The CMS expects the proposal would save about $500 million this year. The American Hospital Association has spoken out vociferously against the proposal.

Medicare is also proposing hip surgeries in surgery centers in addition to just hospitals. Knee and hip surgeries have the highest margins for hospitals, but Medicare is pushing more volume to outpatient services.

“Those are huge dollars you’re talking about there,” Hagood said. “It’s another where a hospital’s lucrative services like joint replacement and imaging are starting to get squeezed from both sides — from CMS and private payers.”

Impact to hospitals

Anthem’s size and importance in the 13 states where it is active means its imaging policy will affect hospital finances. However, Paul Keckley, healthcare researcher and managing editor of The Keckley Report, told Healthcare Dive many hospitals are already competing with freestanding and physician-owned facilities. So, though Anthem’s policy will affect hospitals, Keckley said those facilities are already “accustomed to the downward pressure on their margins.”

Hagood estimates that MRIs and CT scans make up only 5%-10% of a hospital’s business, but those services are profitable and have huge profit margins for hospitals.

Hagood said an MRI for a knee or shoulder would cost about $500 on average in a physician’s office, but that would swell to somewhere between $1,000 and $2,000 at hospitals in many markets. This means hospitals are making an average of $1,000 more on each procedure, he said.

Spread over a year, that’s about $800,000 more profit for hospitals, which these facilities stand to lose with Anthem’s new imaging policy.

Halim said hospitals stand to lose the reimbursements from Anthem, but those with their own freestanding imaging facilities that bill at a lower rate already should be able to capture a portion of the lost revenue.

Beyond hospital finances, the policy change would impact patients both positively and negatively. Anthem patients in a high-deductible plan will pay less out-of-pocket for an MRI or CT scan at freestanding facilities. However, patients not in a high-deductible plan and who may not pay much out-of-pocket anyway, may feel inconvenienced if they’re told they can’t get the services at their local hospital. Plus, if the ordering physician doesn’t direct the patient to a freestanding facility and the person gets the services at a hospital, Anthem could deny the claim and the patient will get stuck with the bill, said Halim.

What will hospitals do?

Hagood doesn’t think hospitals will make up the lost funding in other areas. Instead, he expects staffing cuts and hospitals squeezing vendor contracts for supplies and maintenance.

One way hospitals could respond is by working with the payer to get a little more money for imaging than a freestanding imaging center, but much less than what Anthem has been paying hospitals. Hagood said hospitals may get a “modest premium,” such as maybe get another $100 or $200 for a scan instead of the extra $1,000 Anthem has been paying them.

Halim said hospitals may accept the outpatient payment rate for hospital-based facilities in exchange for a policy waiver. Plus, they may invest more in their own freestanding imaging centers.

“If Anthem represents a significant portion of their revenue — and if the new policy sticks — that may lead some hospitals to consider investing in freestanding facilities so that they can still capture Anthem’s outpatient imaging business,” Halim said.

Originally published on Healthcare Dive.

Payers and providers have for decades stayed in their silos, leading to a more fractured and adversarial healthcare system. That relationship, however, is starting to soften for many in the industry. Payer-provider partnerships put the two groups on the same team in hopes of reducing costs and improving care and outcomes through sharing data and better communication.

A major driver of these partnerships is the move away from fee-for-service payments and toward valued-based payments and population health management.

Originally published on Healthcare Dive.

Republican plans targeting federal funding for health coverage have drawn ire from Americans in all corners of the country, but some of the loudest voices are coming from parents. They have cornered members of Congress at town halls to ask how the slashed budgets will affect some of society’s most vulnerable.

Suggested cuts to Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Plans (CHIP) would throw millions of Americans off insurance and leave hospitals that are already teetering financially facing more uncompensated care. Children’s hospitals, safety net hospitals and rural hospitals will be most affected, and disabled children will face devastating cuts in coverage.

The funding decreases have been proposed in bills making their way through Congress and separately by President Donald Trump. They would shift the cost burden further onto states, many of which have seen success in expanding Medicaid, which is also on the chopping block.

“Children, the elderly, the disabled, and others from our most vulnerable populations would all be affected by these deep budget cuts,” Joanna Hiatt Kim, vice president of policy at the American Hospital Association, told Healthcare Dive. “For hospitals, this could mean more uncompensated care as millions continue to seek needed healthcare without any coverage. For the patient, this could mean delayed care or foregoing care altogether.”

Impact on children’s healthcare

More cuts to Medicaid and CHIP would reverse the trend of fewer uninsured Americans, including children.

Congress created CHIP 20 years ago when 15% of children were uninsured. CHIP, the Affordable Care Act and Medicaid expansion provided more insurance offerings and now only about 5% of children are uninsured. CHIP, which is a federal/state partnership, includes free well-child visits in many states and also provides prescription coverage, inpatient and outpatient care and emergency services.

While suggesting a two-year CHIP extension in his budget plan, Trump proposed a 20% CHIP cut over the next two years. His budget also seeks a $610 billion cut from Medicaid over 10 years, despite early promises to leave the program alone.

Studies have shown that CHIP helps reduce hospitalizations and child mortality, and improves quality of care. The program has bipartisan support. However, HHS Secretary Tom Price voted twice against expansion when he was a congressman.

CHIP is up for reauthorization by Sept. 30 and governors recently spoke out in favor of expanding it. In his budget proposal, Trump proposes a two-year extension of CHIP, but also suggests program cuts, including the matching rate for states.

Jim Kaufman, vice president of public policy at Children’s Hospital Association (CHA), told Healthcare Dive that CHIP helps children’s hospitals.

“CHIP is good for kids, and that makes it good for children’s hospitals and children’s providers,” Kaufman said.

Edwin Park, vice president for health policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, told Healthcare Dive that the cuts would shift costs to states and reduce benefits. He said Trump’s budget would eliminate a 23-percentage-point increase in each state’s federal CHIP matching rate, which is in effect until 2019. That would mean $3.5 billion cut from the program.

The budget would also cut CHIP funding for children with families that have incomes above 250% of the federal poverty line, which would affect 28 states and Washington, D.C. that provide CHIP coverage to children above the income threshold, according to Park.

This will mean states will need to pick up more of the CHIP program costs if they want to maintain the current coverage level. Park said he believes Congress will reauthorize the program, but questions remain about CHIP’s funding and benefits.

Children are about half of Medicaid’s enrollment

The CHA released a report in May that said changes to Medicaid will hurt children, who are the largest group covered under Medicaid. Disabled children will feel the brunt of the pain.

Park said Trump’s proposed budget goes well beyond the Medicaid cuts included in the American Health Care Act (AHCA). The House plan would cut Medicaid by 24% over 10 years. Trump’s budget would reduce the Medicaid budget by 45% in that period.

Park said children make up about half of Medicaid enrollment, but cause very little in costs. Seniors and people with disabilities make up about one-fifth of enrollment, but about half of costs.

Forty-five percent of children with special healthcare needs are on Medicaid. If those children don’t get insurance elsewhere, hospitals would feel the financial burden of caring for those higher cost children without getting reimbursed by Medicaid.

The House approved the AHCA in May, which proposed Medicaid per capita caps starting in 2020 that would be based on 2016 federal Medicaid spending. In a study earlier this year, KFF said that creating a Medicaid block grant or per capita cap “would shift risks and costs to states, enrollees, and providers and could result in reductions in coverage for children.”

Children’s hospitals would be affected more than many other hospitals. The average children’s hospital pay mix is about 54% Medicaid, so children’s hospitals are especially vulnerable if there are large cuts to Medicaid and CHIP at the federal and state levels. Uncompensated care has dropped since CHIP and Medicaid expansion. Kaufman estimated that uncompensated care is an average of about 2% now.

“Since Medicaid is the largest payer of children’s healthcare services and the largest payer for children’s hospitals, the proposed Medicaid cuts included in the AHCA would have a significant impact on the more than 30 million children covered by Medicaid,” said Kaufman. “The states would cut coverage, benefits and access to care. Cuts of this magnitude will have a negative impact on all children’s healthcare.”

The Congressional Budget Office predicts 23 million Americans would lose their health insurance by 2026 under the newest version of the AHCA.

Park said the CBO score confirms the House bill isn’t fixable. “It’s clear just from the cost shift that kids would certainly be facing cuts if the House bill was enacted,” he said. “And that would be particularly problematic for kids who need Medicaid coverage that isn’t provided by private insurance.”