True or False? A Facility That Is Certified as Nf Can Admit Only Medicaid Patients.
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In mid-April 2020, social media users shared a meme implying that hospitals had a financial incentive to inflate the number of COVID-xix patients they were albeit in the midst of the ongoing COVID-19 coronavirus disease pandemic.
The meme contained cerise text that said, "So, hospitals go an extra $xiii,000 if they diagnose a death every bit COVID-19 and an additional $39,000 if they employ a ventilator!" and prompted readers to inquire Snopes.com to verify whether the statement is true:
The thought that hospitals are getting paid $thirteen,000 for patients with COVID-19 diagnoses and $39,000 more if those patients are placed on ventilators appears to accept originated with an interview given on the Fox News prime-time program "Ingraham Angle" by Dr. Scott Jensen, a doc who also serves as a Republican state senator in Minnesota.
During the April nine, 2022 interview, Jensen suggested to host Laura Ingraham that he believed the number of COVID-xix cases in the U.S. was being artificially inflated. "The idea that we're going to allow people to massage and sort of game the numbers is a real issue because nosotros're going to undermine the (public) trust," he said.
Ingraham then played footage from a press conference with comments from Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, in which Fauci called claims that the number of coronavirus cases are being "padded" a conspiracy theory. In an exchange that followed, Jensen suggested that Medicare, the national health intendance plan for the elderly, was paying hospitals prepare amounts for each patient diagnosed and treated for COVID-nineteen:
INGRAHAM: Dr. Fauci was asked well-nigh the COVID death count today. Here's what he said, in part.
[Cutting to briefing]
REPORTER: What exercise you say to those folks who are making the claim without really whatever evidence that these deaths are being padded, that the number of COVID-nineteen deaths are being padded?
FAUCI: You lot will e'er have conspiracy theories when yous take very challenging public health crises. They are zippo but distractions.
[Cutting dorsum to Ingraham]
INGRAHAM: Conspiracy theories, dr.? Then you're engaging in conspiracy theories. What do you lot say to Dr. Fauci tonight?
JENSEN: Well I would remind him that whatever time health care intersects with dollars it gets bad-mannered. Right at present Medicare has determined that if yous take a COVID-nineteen admission to the hospital, you'll get paid $13,000. If that COVID-19 patient goes on a ventilator, you go $39,000, 3 times every bit much. Nobody can tell me after 35 years in the world of medicine that sometimes those kinds of things impact on what nosotros practice.
Nosotros attempted to reach Jensen by phone and e-mail, but did not get a response in time for publication.
We too reached out to the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to ask whether the statement that Medicare was paying hospitals $xiii,000 and $39,000, respectively, for patients admitted with COVID-19 diagnoses and patients with the illness who are placed on ventilators.
A spokesperson for CMS told united states of america that whether hospitals are paid by Medicare for care of a COVID-nineteen patient would depend on whether that patient was covered by Medicare insurance. CMS also told united states of america there is no fix or predetermined corporeality paid to hospitals for diagnosing and treating COVID-nineteen patients, and the amounts would depend on a variety of factors driven by the needs of each patient. Pay-outs would besides depend on the variance of the costs of medical care in dissimilar regions.
The closest match for the numbers cited past Jensen we could locate was in an April vii, 2020, article published by the health care nonprofit Kaiser Family unit Foundation. Equally a starting indicate to estimate how much hospitals might get paid by the federal government for treating uninsured COVID-19 patients, the article used average payments for hospital admissions for like conditions in 2017:
For less severe hospitalizations, we utilize the average Medicare payment for respiratory infections and inflammations with major comorbidities or complications in 2017, which was $thirteen,297. For more severe hospitalizations, we use the boilerplate Medicare payment for a respiratory arrangement diagnosis with ventilator back up for greater than 96 hours, which was $40,218.
Just while these industry estimates are similar to the numbers Jensen cited, they do not correspond actual Medicare payments to hospitals for COVID-nineteen diagnoses or treatment, or even a national average of such payments.
We therefore rate this claim "Mixture." While it seems plausible that Medicare disbursements to hospitals treating COVID-19 patients could be in the range given by Jensen in the Play a trick on News interview (if those patients are covered by Medicare), we found no prove to support Jensen's assertion that "Medicare has determined" that hospitals will be paid $13,000 for patients with COVID-nineteen diagnoses or $39,000 for COVID-19 patients identify on ventilators.
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Source: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/medicare-hospitals-covid-patients/