April 18, 2006

Chicago Tribune
Voice of the People
Via e-mail

To the Editor:

Your April 14 th story, State Lets Medicaid Payments Pile up, illustrates what happens when government’s worthy goal of expanding health care benefits for those in need collides with financial realities and tight budgets. Physicians have a long history of giving charity care to the poor, and many today consider the state’s Medicaid program tantamount to providing wholly uncompensated care. Medicaid rates for many medical services are abysmally low, with delays for reimbursement so long that some physicians despair of ever getting paid. Over the last decade, Medicaid’s average payment rates have increased only 11 percent, while the accompanying expenses of operating a physician office have grown by almost 50 percent. In recognition of these low rates, Medicaid was recently mandated by the courts to double Medicaid’s preventive care reimbursements, which were previously so low they jeopardized patient access to care.

At a time when Illinois is rolling out a major expansion of Medicaid called All Kids¸ the state must first attend to correcting Medicaid’s financial underpinnings. Not doing so puts the entire All Kids program at risk.

The math is not at all fuzzy: physicians can’t continue to cover the medical office rent, pay their employees, and keep the lights turned on, when the state fails to live up to its obligation to pay bills in a timely fashion. Something, somewhere has to give – and we at ISMS hope it’s not access to care for the poorest and most vulnerable patients in need.

Peter E. Eupierre, M.D.
President
Illinois State Medical Society

Twenty North Michigan Avenue, Suite 700 Chicago, Illinois 60602 Telephone: 312-782-1654 Toll Free: 800-782-ISMS Fax: 312-782-2028