Bill doesn’t do enough to help rural hospitals
Senate Rural Health Caucus Letter to Burwell
LC
Lindsey Corey
|
Today 3:18 PM
Diane Calmus;
Alex Olson;
Maggie Elehwany;
Erin Mahn
Awesome, Diane.
My edits and possible headlines are included below.
Thanks,
Lindsey
From: Diane Calmus
Sent: Friday, July 15, 2016 1:35 PM
To: Lindsey Corey <lcorey@nrharural.org>
Cc: Alex Olson <aolson@nrharural.org>; Maggie Elehwany <MElehwany@nrharural.org>; Erin Mahn <EMahn@nrharural.org>
Subject: Fw: Senate Rural Health Caucus Letter to Burwell
Two separate blog posts for your review...
(1)
NRHA supports senators’ letter to HHS
The National Rural Health Association applauds the co-chairs of the bipartisan Senate Rural Health Caucus for their letter to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell urging the agency to work toward including rural providers in Medicare and Medicaid quality measurement and improvement programs based on the recommendations of the National Quality Forum’s Rural Health Committee of which NRHA is a member.
The caucus co-chairs, Sens. John Barrasso (R-WY), Al Franken (D-MN), Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND), and Pat Roberts (R-KS), urged HHS to convene a rural workgroup to identify measures and measure gaps for rural health care improvement to ensure quality programs are tailored to the unique experiences and challenges of rural health care.
NRHA supports this effort and will continue to work with our rural champions on Capitol Hill to shape these efforts going forward.
(2)
Bill doesn’t do enough to help rural hospitals
Sens. Al Franken (D-Minn.) and Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D) recently introduced a bill that establishes a core set of health care quality measures for rural providers and provides grants for rural providers to participate in quality improvement and reporting programs.
The National Rural Health Association is pleased with steps working toward including rural providers in Medicare and Medicaid quality measurement and improvement programs based on the recommendations of the National Quality Forum’s Rural Health Committee of which NRHA is a member.
However, NRHA is disappointed the bill fails to address the needs of the many rural hospitals struggling with continued Medicare cuts that have resulted in negative average Medicare margins and have made one in three rural hospitals vulnerable to closure.