Is Your Connecticut Hospital Being Penalized By Medicare?

CONNECTICUT —The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has released data indicating 26 Connecticut hospitals will pay the consequences for excessive patient readmissions.

From October 2021 through September 2022, 72 percent of all Connecticut hospitals in the program will face a loss in CMS payments. The penalties are meted out as part of the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program, designed to make hospitals pay more attention to patients after they leave.

Nationwide, Medicare is reducing its payments to 2,499 hospitals, or 47 percent of all facilities.

Rockville General Hospital suffered the highest penalty in the state, and will lose 2.3 percent of its Medicare payments. No Connecticut hospital received the maximum penalty of 3 percent.

The HRRP was created by the 2010 Affordable Care Act and began in October 2012. This is the tenth year penalties have been exacted by CMS. This year’s round of penalties was based on tracking patients from July 1, 2017 through Dec. 1, 2019.

The data indicates the program is working. Readmission rates have dropped steadily since its implementation, according to the most recent analysis by the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission. Readmission for heart failure patients dropped from 24.8 percent to 20.5 percent, heart attack patient rates dropped from 19.7 percent to 15.5 percent, and pneumonia patient rates decreased from 20 percent to 15.8 percent.

Nationwide, 39 hospitals received the maximum 3 percent hit, and 547 hospitals escaped paying any penalty because they had so few readmissions. Medicare estimates the penalties over the next fiscal year will save the U.S. $521 million, according to Kaiser Health News.