Idaho patients need congressional action to protect Medicare access to physicians

Medicare in Idaho is under attack from soaring inflation, burdensome bureaucratic red tape and congressional neglect. Without action from Congress, Medicare cuts will be enacted, and thousands of Idahoans may lose access to their doctors.

I urge our congressional delegation to drive a bipartisan solution that protects vulnerable patients in our state.

Roughly 360,000 Idaho residents are enrolled in Medicare. But to use this program, you must have access to a participating physician.

Unfortunately, rural Americans have less access to care due to a shortage of rural physicians. More rural residents are covered under Medicare and these cuts will make it even more difficult to attract physicians to those areas.

As an interventional cardiologist in Caldwell, with offices in Weiser and Emmett, I see the consequences of a broken rural health care system every day. Our health outcomes, quality of life and life expectancy are negatively impacted.

Compounding a longstanding shortage of physicians are new pressures from the pandemic years.

Our state is experiencing significant population growth, with roughly 53,000 new residents joining our ranks in 2021 alone.

On its own, this is a great thing. However, it adds another burden to our already strained health care system.

For starters, the great resignation has hit the medical sector in Idaho particularly hard, with over 9,000 medical jobs currently vacant today.

Unfortunately, help is not on the way as we rank 46 out of 50 states in the total number of current medical students, and 70% of last year’s graduating medical class from Idaho schools joined out-of-state residency programs.

You don’t have to be a physician on the front lines to see the giant iceberg our health care system is barreling toward. Unfortunately, a lack of awareness or care for rural Americans means that Congress is on track to deliver yet another potentially decisive blow to Idaho’s Medicare system.

Physician participation in the program is already at risk because of the economics and needless, time-consuming administrative red tape.

An American Medical Association analysis of Medicare Trustees data from 2001–2021 shows that physician payments have fallen by 20% when adjusted for inflation.

Additionally, costly financial cuts to physicians participating in the program are scheduled to become law in 2023. Whether or not Congress prevents these cuts could determine access for thousands of Idahoans.

Congress can address immediate threats to Medicare by passing two pieces of legislation.

H.R. 8800, the Supporting Medicare Providers Act of 2022, is a bipartisan bill that will prevent a scheduled 4.5% Medicare payment reduction from going into effect in January 2023.

The second bipartisan bill, H.R. 6048, the Medicare Stability for Patients and Providers Act, would correct the implementation of Medicare’s clinical labor formula. Together, these two laws would address the immediate threats to Medicare patient access.

Idahoans need a commonsense solution from our members of Congress.

This story was originally published November 22, 2022 at 4:00 AM.