Louisiana Nursing Home Owners Likely To File Lawsuit Against State For Lower Medicaid Rate Increase In 2009, Health Official Says

Main Category: Medicare / Medicaid / SCHIP
Also Included In: Caregivers / Homecare;  Seniors / Aging
Article Date: 29 May 2008 - 5:00 PDT

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Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals Secretary Alan Levine on Friday said that the state likely would face a lawsuit from nursing home owners if Medicaid cuts approved by the state House are not restored, the New Orleans Times-Picayune reports (Moller, New Orleans Times-Picayune, 5/24). The House this month approved a $30 billion state budget for fiscal year 2009 that is $240 million less than Gov. Bobby Jindal's (R) proposed budget.

Jindal's original budget called for a $600 million increase in Medicaid funding, including about $21 million for new initiatives. The House Appropriations Committee cut the spending increase by $183 million but did not specify where the reductions would come from. In a letter to House and Senate leaders last week, Levine wrote that the cuts would affect a wide range of health care providers, and the biggest reductions would be for hospitals, nursing homes and pharmacies.

Levine said that implementing the Medicaid cuts would include $38.6 million in payment cuts to nursing homes (Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, 5/22). On Friday during a state Senate Finance Committee hearing, Levine said nursing homes are entitled by law to receive a rate increase that would cost the state about $69 million.

Commissioner of Administration Angele Davis has asked lawmakers to restore the health care cuts. Doing so, however, could bring the proposed budget near the constitutional cap on state spending, according to the Times-Picayune (New Orleans Times-Picayune, 5/24).

Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.kaisernetwork.org. You can view the entire Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery at http://www.kaisernetwork.org/dailyreports/healthpolicy. The Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report is published for kaisernetwork.org, a free service of The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.

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