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WASHINGTON, July 31 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The American Health Care Association (AHCA) and the Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care applaud today's decision by the Bush Administration to reverse proposed Medicare cuts, crediting a number of key Republican and Democratic congressional leaders with spearheading the successful effort to avert $770 million cuts to U.S. seniors' Medicare Part A nursing home care in FY 2009 and more than $5 billion over five years.
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"The bottom-line news from today's announcement is that Medicare beneficiaries are deservedly the big winners, and will continue to benefit from ready access to the high quality, post-acute care they need and deserve," stated Bruce Yarwood, President and CEO of AHCA. "Members of the House and Senate have worked effectively in bipartisan fashion with the Administration to ensure U.S. seniors' ongoing care needs are protected."
Alan G. Rosenbloom, President of the Alliance, stated, "From a policy standpoint, this is an outstanding development in terms of both meeting seniors' changing health care needs, and doing so in a manner that uses Medicare funds efficiently. The Administration and Congress deserve enormous credit for working in an intelligent, collegial, bipartisan manner to help achieve today's positive results."
Specifically, AHCA and the Alliance praised Senators Kent Conrad (D-ND) Norm Coleman (R-MN) and John Sununu (R-NH), and House Members Earl Pomeroy (D-ND), Shelley Berkley (D-NV), and Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), who rallied the support of nearly half the U.S. Senate and over 110 Members of the U.S. House of Representatives, urging CMS to prevent any cuts.
Yarwood and Rosenbloom also said the long term care profession will be expressing thanks to a large number of U.S. Senate and House members in the coming days for their leadership and help in working with the White House and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to stop the Medicare regulation from going into effect.
AHCA and the Alliance praised the Administration for moving forward on many fronts related to quality improvement that have made a positive difference in seniors' quality of care and quality of life. Yarwood and Rosenbloom said that the profession is grateful that the Administration's action taken today will provide further support for successful quality improvement initiatives in the future.
SOURCE American Health Care Association; Alliance for Quality Nursing Home Care
