2006 proposed fee schedule - American Society of Clinical Oncology

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3. This column shows the percent change between proposed and current payments to ESRD facilities. The proposed
payments include the wage adjusted composite rate, and the 8.9% drug add-on times treatments plus proposed payment
for separately billable drugs. The current payment to ESRD facilities includes the current wage adjusted composite rate
times treatments plus current drug payments for separately billable drugs.
Table 37 above shows the impact of this year’s proposed
changes to payments to hospital based and independent ESRD
facilities. We have included both composite rate payments
as well as payments for separately billable drugs and
biologicals because both are affected by the proposed
changes. The first column of Table 37 identifies the type
of ESRD provider, the second column indicates the number of
ESRD facilities for each type, and the third column
indicates the number of dialysis treatments.
The fourth column shows the effect of proposed changes
to the ESRD wage index as it affects the composite rate
payments to ESRD facilities. The fourth column compares
aggregate wage adjusted composite rate payments using the
proposed ESRD wage index compared to the current ESRD wage
adjusted composite rate payments. The overall effect to all
ESRD providers in aggregate is zero because the proposed
ESRD wage index has been multiplied by a budget neutrality
factor to comply with the statutory requirement that any
wage index revisions be done in a manner that results in the
same aggregate amount of expenditures as would have been
made without any changes in the wage index. The percent
changes shown in the fifth and sixth columns are the result