By Mike Shields
KHI News Service
WASHINGTON, D.C., June 15 Sixteen farm state senators, Republican and Democrat, have joined to co-sponsor a bill they said would sustain or improve rural health care and honor a colleague who died earlier this month.
“It is with mixed emotions that Iintroduce the Rural Hospital and Provider Equity Act of 2007, or R HoPE,” said U.S. Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., “This proposal is the result of months of work with my friend and colleague, Sen. Craig Thomas, who just passed away. In fact, Sen. Thomas and I were getting ready to introduce this bill the week we lost him.”
Thomas, a 74-year-old Wyoming Republican, died June 4 of leukemia.
U.S. Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., was Conrad”s lead co-sponsor on S1605, which was named the Craig Thomas R-HoPE Act of 2007 in tribute to the late, three-term senator.
Rural health care providers typically receive lesser reimbursement for Medicare services than their urban counterparts. The bill would partially remedy that, particularly with respect to ambulance, hospital, and laboratory services. It also would extend several soon-to-expire Medicare changes beneficial to rural providers first passed in 2003.
“Rural health care providers have very different needs than their urban counterparts,” Roberts said. “It is important that we realize health care is not one size fits all.”
“We cannot allow providers to lose 3 percent on nearly every patient they see. But that is what is occurring in rural America today,” Conrad said.
The bill was introduced Wednesday but its full text hadn”t been received by the Government Printing Office as of Friday morning. It would amend various provisions of Title XVIII of the Social Security Act and was referred to the Senate Finance Committee.
Among the bill”s multiple provisions:
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It would extend to January 2010, provisions in current law that provide incentive payments for doctors who practice in underserved rural areas and adjust Medicare reimbursements so that those paid to rural physicians are more in line with those paid to urban doctors.
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Rural ambulance services would be provided 5-percent bonus payments for 2008 and 2009.
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It would create a capital infrastructure loan program to help rural facilities improve crumbling buildings and infrastructure and provide planning grants to help assess capital and infrastructure needs.
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Expand the types of professionals eligible for Medicare reimbursement for mental health services.
“Currently, the Medicare program only permits psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, and clinical nurse specialists to bill Medicare for mental health services provided to seniors,” Roberts said. “Most rural counties do not have a psychiatrist or a psychologist. This bill permits marriage and family therapists and licensed professional counselors to bill Medicare for their services and be paid the rate of social workers. These providers are much more likely to practice in a rural setting and are often the only mental health professionals available.”
-Mike Shields is a staff writer for KHI News Service, which specializes in coverage of health issues facing Kansans. He can be reached at
mshields@khi.org
or at 785-233-5443, ext. 123.