All hospitals are different in their own ways. Several factors go into a determination of whether a hospital is safe and delivers good health outcomes. Jordan Rau reports for Kaiser Health News that Medicare is penalizing more than eight in ten hospitals it assesses for high readmission rates. Will these penalties help ensure your hospital is providing good care?
Unfortunately, hospitals too often do not deliver on a variety of fronts. This year, Medicare is penalizing 2,499 of 3,046 hospitals because of their high readmission rates. These hospitals will see lower payments from Medicare.
Medicare’s monetary penalties can be more or less large, depending upon the severity of the hospital’s performance. Medicare looks at readmission rates for heart attack and heart failure patients, as well as pneumonia patients. The penalties are intended to have hospitals focus more heavily on patient needs pre-discharge and to keep them from benefiting financially from patient readmissions within 30 days of discharge.
Thirty-nine hospitals will see a three percent penalty on all reimbursements through the end of September 2022. More than 2,000 will see a penalty of .64 percent. While that might seem low, it still can amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars in less than a year.
Most important, do these penalties lead hospitals to improve the quality of care they deliver? Or, do hospitals simply find other ways to make up for lost revenue from Medicare? The Medicare Payment Advisory Commission or MedPac has found that Medicare’s penalties have led to reduced readmission rates overall, without increasing mortality rates.
Medicare cannot impose monetary penalties on 2,216 hospitals in the US for a variety of reasons. They might treat children or psychiatric patients or veterans. They might be rehab facilities or provide long-term care. Putting those hospitals aside, Medicare has determined that nearly half of all hospitals in the US are not up to snuff.
Only 547 of the hospitals on which Medicare can impose monetary penalties will not see a penalty this go round. Because quality of care in hospitals varies so dramatically, it is important to choose your hospital carefully.
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