Hospitals Question Feds’ Plan for Doling Out New GME Slots

Last year Congress created 1000 new Medicare-supported graduate medical education residency slots.  This year hospitals are unhappy about how regulators propose assigning those new slots. At issue, according to those who responded to CMS’s proposal for apportioning the slots, is the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ heavy reliance on assigning those slots to providers in Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs).  While the legislation calls for incorporating HPSAs into the distribution methodology, provider interests point out, it did not call for the degree of reliance on HPSAs that regulators propose.  Doing so, they insist, is contrary to congressional intent. Learn [...]