Experts Examine Effect of Cost-Shifting on Hospitals and Physicians

11/7/2002

From: Hollis Hope or Bonnie Austin, 202-292-6700, both of AcademyHealth

News Advisory:

Cost-shifting is said to occur when a health care provider raises its prices to private payers in response to administrative price changes by a public payer. For example, a hospital may raise prices to private payers in response to reductions in Medicare payment rates. What are the public policy implications of cost-shifting?

Leading experts will explore the cost-shifting dynamic among public and private payers and implications for hospitals and physicians at a meeting sponsored by The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Changes in Health Care Financing and Organization (HCFO) program November 13. Panelists will address what is known about the cost-shifting dynamic from economic theory and research, and how health care stakeholders manage the challenges of declining public payments.

A prominent panel of experts will discuss cost-shifting in the context of Medicare solvency, providers' continued participation in the program, access problems for beneficiaries, and the return to double-digit health care inflation for commercial plans.

Who: Stuart Altman of Brandeis University, Robert Berenson of AcademyHealth, Nancy-Ann DeParle of JP Morgan, Charles Kahn III, of the Federation of American Hospitals, and Robert Reischauer of the Urban Institute, among others

What: "When Public Payment Declines Does Cost-Shifting Occur? Hospital and Physician Responses"

When: Wednesday, Nov. 13, 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m.

Where: Wyndham Washington, 1400 M St., N.W., Washington, D.C.

Media are invited to attend. Please RSVP to Hollis Hope or Bonnie Austin, 202-292-6700.

Note: Webcasts of selected sessions will be available at http:/www.kaisernetwork.org/healthcast/academyhealth.13nov02, a service of the Kaiser Family Foundation, after 5 p.m. ET on Thursday, November 14.

The HCFO program (http://www.hcfo.net) supports research, policy analysis, demonstration, and evaluation projects that examine major changes in health care financing and organization that have current policy implications. AcademyHealth (http://www.academyhealth.org) is the national program office for HCFO. It is the professional home for health services researchers, policy analysts, and practitioners, and a leading, non-partisan resource for the best in health research and policy.