Statement on Proposed CY 2017 OPPS Rule

Tom Nickels 
Executive Vice President, 
Government Relations and Public Policy 
American Hospital Association

July 6, 2016

We are extremely dismayed by the short-sighted policies in today’s proposed rule. Hospitals and health systems and more than half of the House and the Senate requested that CMS provide reasonable flexibility when implementing Section 603 of the Bipartisan Budget Act of 2015 in order to ensure that patients have continued access to hospital care. Instead, the agency is actually proposing to provide no funding support for outpatient departments for the services they provide to patients. This does not reflect the reality of how hospitals strive to serve the needs of their communities. In addition, CMS’s refusal to continue current reimbursement to hospitals that need to relocate or rebuild their outpatient facilities in order to provide needed updates and ensure patient access is unreasonable and troubling. Taken together, it appears that CMS is aiming to freeze the progress of hospital-based health care in its tracks. We will submit detailed comments to the agency urging them to revise these misguided policies so that hospitals can continue to provide the highest quality health care to their communities.

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About the AHA

The AHA is a not-for-profit association of health care provider organizations and individuals that are committed to the health improvement of their communities. The AHA is the national advocate for its members, which include nearly 5,000 hospitals, health care systems, networks, other providers of care and 43,000 individual members. Founded in 1898, the AHA provides education for health care leaders and is a source of information on health care issues and trends. For more information, visit the AHA website at www.aha.org.