Diabetes Health in The News Podcast: CMS to Assess Penalties for Hospital-Acquired Illnesses
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CMS has recently cut payments to 769 U.S. hospitals with high patient injury rates, and for the first time, this included the spread of antibiotic-resistant germs. These punishments come during the third year of Medicare penalties applied to hospitals with high patient injury rates, including patients who suffer from potentially avoidable complications like blood clots, bed sores, infections, and falls.
The hospitals that have been identified as problems will lose 1% of their Medicare payments for the year. A dollar amount for those penalties has not been released, but for many larger hospitals, they will likely exceed $1 million. In total, hospitals stand to lose about $430 million – 18% more than hospitals lost last year.
Overall, hospital-acquired conditions are on the decline, falling 21% between 2010 and 2015. The greatest reductions were for post-surgical blood clots, catheter infections, and adverse medication reactions.
These findings were published in Kaiser Health News on December 21, 2016.
