CMS has proposed Primary Care raises funded with specialist cuts. Medicare would reduce reimbursement for many types of specialists to fund sizable raises for primary care physicians in 2013. These reductions and raises are apart from the huge pay cut — now put at 27% — set for January 1, 2013, that is triggered by Medicare's sustainable growth rate formula, and likely to be postponed by Congress. In the proposed rule, CMS included a slew of potential changes to the physician-fee schedule for 2013, including a 7% payment increase for family physicians and smaller increases for other primary-care doctors. The proposed pay hike for family physicians comes from a plan to reimburse such providers separately for providing successful follow-up care after a patient's hospital or nursing-home stay.
