Copyright 1999 The Hartford Courant Company
THE
HARTFORD COURANT
August 28, 1999 Saturday, STATEWIDE
SECTION: EDITORIAL; Pg. A16
LENGTH: 262 words
HEADLINE:
MEDICARE RULES IMPOSE A HARDSHIP
BYLINE: Stephen A. Karp
Executive Director
National Association of Social Workers
Connecticut Chapter
Rocky
Hill
BODY:
The Page 1 article on the impact on
nursing homes of changes in Medicare [Aug. 17,
"Medicare Rewrites The Rules On Nursing Home Payments"] touched
upon many of the problems resulting from these Medicare cuts in
payment.
What was left out, though, was the negative effects these
changes are having on nursing home patients in need of mental health services.
Under the new rules, clinical social
workers can no longer bill Medicare
directly when
providing mental health services to a nursing home patient.
Instead the cost
of those services must be paid by the nursing home out of its
Medicare reimbursement rate.
This
becomes one more added cost to the nursing home, which the facility
now must
consider when determining the type of patient it will admit.
Psychologists and psychiatrists can still bill
Medicare directly when
seeing nursing home patients, but
Medicare must reimburse them at a higher
rate.
Clinical social workers provide the
majority of mental health services to
patients in nursing homes. They are
also the most cost-effective mental health
provider under
Medicare.
Thus the changes in
Medicare have created two major problems: Patients will
not
have as ready access to a mental health professional, and
Medicare will
now pay a higher reimbursement rate for
required mental health services. In
both cases, this makes no sense.
Proposed legislation has been introduced to recify this
problem. This
legislation would reinstate clinical social
workers for direct Medicare
reimbursement.
LOAD-DATE: August 30, 1999
