Nick Hut

Segments of the U.S. healthcare system often operate at cross purposes, meaning improved alignment will be vital to achieving systemic progress. Fragmentation is apparent not only between payers and providers or clinicians and administrators, but also in the tension between efforts to innovate while keeping care cost-effective, and between formulating policy and putting it into…

Federal telehealth policy continues to prove confounding for healthcare providers. The recent 43-day government shutdown marked the first extended period since the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic that traditional restrictions on telehealth reimbursement were in place. Medicare waivers of those restrictions helped telehealth utilization surge during the pandemic and remain elevated in the years…

Dec. 12 update House Republican leaders plan to hold a vote this coming week on legislation to address healthcare costs. The bill does not include an extension of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) enhanced subsidies, which are set to expire at year’s end. As a nod to moderates in the party who have pushed for…

Hospitals are going to court in an effort to thwart major changes to the 340B Drug Pricing Program. The American Hospital Association (AHA) was among a group that filed a lawsuit against the federal government Dec. 1, seeking to have implementation of a planned 340B rebate model halted before it begins Jan. 1. Under the…

After Congress ended the longest federal government shutdown on record at 43 days, the future of enhanced subsidies under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) remained unresolved. The shutdown officially ended Nov. 12, three days after eight members of the Senate Democratic caucus joined Republicans to help pass a continuing resolution that maintains spending through Jan.…

Hospitals face additional and potentially more demanding price transparency reporting requirements in 2026, as finalized in new CMS regulations. The final rule for hospital outpatient departments and ambulatory surgical centers includes provisions building off the current transparency regulations. The new language is intended to ensure that hospitals “provide meaningful, accurate information about the amount they…

While implementing several policies that could constrain hospital finances next year and beyond, CMS offered temporary relief on one count. The Medicare 2026 final rule for hospital outpatient departments and ambulatory surgical centers (ASCs) was proposed to include an across-the-board 2% cut to base payments. But CMS, acknowledging the concerns of hospitals, kept the scheduled…

Senate Republicans used a recent hearing to press their case for enacting immediate reforms to part of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), with little sign they will agree to extend the subsidy framework that has been in place for more than four years. During the Nov. 19 hearing of the Senate Finance Committee, members of…

CMS issued preliminary guidance about how it will implement new restrictions on Medicaid provider taxes as required by the budget reconciliation law known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA). OBBBA language will curb provider taxes as a Medicaid funding mechanism through which states can increase their allotment of federal matching dollars that, in…

Macroeconomic factors are causing a moderate drop in demand for healthcare services, according to insights from executives with a pair of leading for-profit hospital chains. At Community Health Systems (CHS), the first quarter of 2025 brought strong hospital volumes, but those dipped during the middle part of the year. Same-store adjusted admissions were 0.7% lower…