CAP TODAY Pathology/Laboratory Medicine/Laboratory Management
Charles Fiegl
June 2014—The CAP’s leaders say they will keep pushing for favorable pathology payment policies as federal regulators implement new legislation that could lead to steep cuts in Medicare rates.
Six weeks before the May 5–7 CAP Policy Meeting in Washington, DC, Congress enacted the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014. The bill, signed into law April 1, stopped cuts to physician services under the flawed Medicare sustainable growth rate formula used to calculate Medicare pay. But the act, which represents the 17th time a temporary SGR fix has been used since 2003, also included several Medicare reforms that will affect pathologists.
The CAP had strongly advocated a permanent fix to the SGR, which was set to cut physician rates by about 24 percent if not for the temporary stopgap measure enacted by Congress. The SGR again will threaten Medicare pay in April 2015.