The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services wants to pay hospitals more for most Part B drugs, biologicals and radiopharmaceuticals administered in their outpatient departments.
Acute care hospitals could receive a 3.2 percent inflation adjustment to their payment rates under the Outpatient Prospective Payment System in 2006, CMS announced July 18.
CMS' proposed rule contains policy changes and updated payment rates, including:
CMS also proposes to implement the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission's recommendations to Congress regarding payment changes for outpatient diagnostic imaging procedures.
When a hospital performs two or more procedures in the same CMS-identified imaging procedure "family," Medicare will pay for the first procedure in full and 50 percent of the second and subsequent procedures, according to CMS.
The proposed OPPS rule appears in the July 25 Federal Register, and CMS is taking comments on the rule until Sept. 16, 2005.