Medicare Compliance & Reimbursement

Your payments have been frozen since 2001, senators note.

If Congress doesn't get its act together, you could face another 5-percent cut to your overall Medicare reimbursement next year, warns a new letter from Sens. Jon Kyl (R-AZ) and Deborah Stabenow (D-MI).

And payments are set to shrink by 37 percent by 2015, according to the letter to Senate leaders Bill Frist (R-TN) and Harry Reid (D-NV). "The average 2006 Medicare rates for physicians are about the same as they were in 2001," says the letter, which 80 senators signed. If the cuts go through, payments will have fallen roughly 20 percent behind inflation for medical practice costs.

The senators point to predictions that there could be a shortage of 85,000 physicians by 2020. They also cite an American Medical Association survey showing 47 percent of physicians will decrease their numbers of new Medicare patients if next year's cuts go through. "To preserve Medicare beneficiaries' access to care, we must act soon to avert these cuts to physician payments," they write.