MedPAC Members Supportive of Upping Medicare Pay Rates Close to the Inflation Rate
MedPage Today December 12, 2024
— Proposed recommendation would give extra pay bump to providers serving low-income beneficiaries
Members of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission (MedPAC) seemed favorable Thursday to a proposed recommendation to Congress that Medicare should pay physicians based on the rate of medical inflation and give primary care doctors who serve low-income beneficiaries an extra pay bump.
“I think the chair’s recommendation is directionally correct,” said commission member Cheryl Damberg, PhD, MPH, of the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California.
“I really support the idea of this being paired with the Medicare safety net add-on payment; I think that’s a critical factor, and I hope that policymakers will seriously consider that piece of it,” she said. “The data around access issues for...