Doctors face a 22% cut in pay when treating Medicaid and Medicare patients if the $500 billion dollars scheduled to be cut out of the programs take effect. Though no one actually believes that the cuts will ever take effect, everyone knows that some amount must be.
In most cases doctors are small businessmen. With the latest, “doctor fix,” pay schedule only lasting six months this time around, physicians are faced with making cuts. One doctor is considering laying off her office manager, dropping Medicare, click here, patients, or moving her office to a less expensive part of town, further from her elderly patients.
The AMA states that 68% of physicians will limit the number of Medicare and Medicaid patients they treat if the reimbursement rates continue to be lessened. This will result in emergency rooms filling up even more, causing health insurance rates to climb higher and higher.
Michael Higgins
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