Charity Care

The individual mandate has driven an increase in the number of insured patients, and without it, hospitals are likely to face more uninsured patients and more patients with high co-pays and deductibles.

What is the industrywide uncollectable percentage for accounts receivable that hospitals can set aside as up-front reserves?

Is a free service provided on the basis of presumptive eligibility allowable for charity on the S-10 worksheet?

What are best practices related to aging accounts receivable buckets and determination of reserve rate-based time frames?

Is a free service provided on the basis of presumptive eligibility allowable for charity on Medicare’s cost report worksheet S-10?

The community benefits provided by not-for-profit hospitals outweigh the federal tax revenue that is not collected from these organizations. 

The IRS stated that a rural hospital had failed to conduct a proper community health needs assessment and make it widely available to the public. The hospital’s tax-exempt status under section 501(c)(3) was revoked retroactively.

For internal reporting, can underpayments and contractual write-offs be included when reporting uncompensated care?

Four Milwaukee-area health systems are working together to complete federally mandated community needs assessments more efficiently. They partner with 18 local health departments to collect and analyze data that informs their local health improvement strategies.

Medicaid expansion reduced the amount of hospital charity care in participating states, while charity care remained almost unchanged in non-participating states during the same time period.