House and Senate Approve Payroll Tax Conference Report
In votes taken Friday morning, the House and Senate approved the Payroll Tax Conference Committee's Conference Report extending a number of rural Medicare Extenders and updating the sustainable growth rate (SGR). Several of these critical rural Medicare provisions were seriously threatened in recent months but, because of your advocacy and persistence, NRHA was successful in making sure a number of the provisions were included in the final package:
- Ten-month extension of outpatient hold-harmless provision for hospitals under 100 beds.
- Ten-month extension of the current geographic practice cost index
- Ten-month update of the sustainable growth rate (SGR)
- Ten-month extension of the current payment levels for rural ambulance providers
- Four-month extension of current “508 Hospital” wage index reclassification
- Four-month extension of the current technical component for pathology lab services