New Bill Aims to Boost Medicare Access to Chronic Care Services

New legislation aims to eliminate the cost-sharing requirement for Medicare beneficiaries to get chronic care management services and reimburse providers for 100% of the payment. The legislation, reintroduced Thursday, intends to boost access among seniors to chronic care management services that include creating a care plan and medication reconciliation and adherence. “Chronic health conditions account for 90% of our nation’s healthcare spending and this is a meaningful way to lower costs and improve health outcomes.” Currently, a Medicare beneficiary with two or more chronic conditions can get management services that were added to Medicare back in 2015. However, over the first two years, the services were instituted only 684,000 out of 35 million eligible beneficiaries got the services, according to a fact sheet on the legislation.