Medicare Cuts to Physician Payments; Gravely Disappointing, says the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA)

Today, the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) expressed its grave disappointment with Congressional leaders’ decision to cut Medicare payments for physicians as part of a large final end-of-year legislative package. The cuts will be effective January 1, 2023. Additional cuts will be implemented in January of 2024.

Over the course of 2022, ASA joined in an unprecedented joint lobbying campaign with the nation’s top surgical organizations (the Surgical Care Coalition) to block all cuts to Medicare payment to physicians. ASA also joined with the nation’s leading organizations representing critical care physicians to urge Congress to provide appropriate Medicare payment support to those physicians on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic and now the viral “triple-demic.”

“We are extremely disappointed with this outcome,” said ASA President Michael W. Champeau, MD, FASA. “The entire Medicare payment system that is supposed to ensure appropriate payments for the essential services provided by our members is fundamentally broken – it just doesn’t work.”

The combination of these Medicare cuts and the badly flawed implementation of the No Surprises Act is creating a perfect storm threatening  anesthesiologists’ practices across the country. ASA is exploring legal, regulatory and legislative options for 2023 to address this threat.

About the American Society of Anesthesiologists Founded in 1905, the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) is an educational, research and scientific society with more than 56,000 members organized to raise and maintain the standards of the medical practice of anesthesiology. ASA is committed to ensuring physician anesthesiologists evaluate and supervise the medical care of patients before, during and after surgery to provide the highest quality and safest care every patient deserves.

For more information on the field of anesthesiology, visit the American Society of Anesthesiologists online at asahq.org. To learn more about the role physician anesthesiologists play in ensuring patient safety, visit asahq.org/madeforthismoment. Like ASA on Facebook and follow ASALifeline on Twitter.