This one puzzled me (below) - why arbitrarily increase payments for "ancillary services" and decrease services for therapy in nursing facilities? All I can figure is maybe cafeteria workers, cashiers, etc are members of SEIU and this is a payoff for the union. Oh and while we're at it, screw the nurses and physical therapists - I guess they're not unionized.
Check this out: On page 229, lines 7-17. ” [T]he Secretary of Health and Human Services shall...for skilled nursing facility services...increase payment by 10 percent for non-therapy ancillary services...and shall decrease payment for the therapy case mix component of such rates by 5.5 percent.” The Czar deleted a lot of Social Security Act cross-references here, so that you could see the words that matter. The Czar is not sure what a 10 percent increase for non-therapy ancillary services could be, but in a skilled nursing facility, that means things like the beauty shop, the cafeteria, and computer training. Therapy case mix components is a fairly obscure Medicare term that describes patients who need a combination of occupational, physical, and speech therapy. So your tax dollars will increase payments to things like manicures, but decrease money available to therapy programs that actually make skilled nursing patients recover. Unbelievable. The Czar put his grandmother into an attic for a decade, but if he had put her into a skilled nursing facility, he would prefer she spend her time getting physical therapy rather than a second cup of fruit salad at lunch. |
