Lebanon
In the state’s original budget, the state’s hospitals would have gotten $166 million this year in disproportionate share hospital payments and D-H, the largest provider of Medicaid services in the state, would have gotten about $42 million of that, D-H spokesman Rick Adams said in an email. Such payments, also known as DSH payments, are split evenly between the state and the federal governments and are intended to help cover hospitals’ costs related to uncompensated care.
The new agreement, approved as part of a larger budget deal by both houses of the New Hampshire Legislature last week, brings the total the hospitals expect to $224.6 million this year and $227.6 million next year.
Nearly a quarter of those payments, or $53 million this year, is expected to go to D-H, Adams wrote.
“This bill … provides a long-term plan for Disproportionate Share Hospital payments, settling the dispute between the state and hospitals, ensuring that our critical access hospitals can remain open to serve communities across the state,” Senate President Chuck Morse, R-Salem, said in a release after the bill’s passage last Wednesday.
The bill, HB 1817, which Gov. Chris Sununu is expected to sign, resolves a longstanding dispute over uncompensated care and comes following an April decision in federal district court in Washington, D.C.
That decision voided a 2017 federal rule that reduced the amount owed to hospitals in such payments.
The New Hampshire Legislature used the lower amount in creating the state’s budget — a figure that was rendered inadequate when the federal court ruled in the hospitals’ favor.
The hospitals were owed an additional $36 million in state DSH payments each year, Joe Bouchard, assistant commissioner of the New Hampshire Department of Administrative Services, said in an interview earlier this month.
When the state and hospitals reached a deal earlier this month about how much would be paid out, hospitals settled for less than they were owed “in exchange for a longer-term and more sustainable structure,” according to a statement from the New Hampshire Hospital Association at the time.
For 2018, the bill allows for the hospitals to receive an additional $29 million from the state — which will be $58 million with the federal match, Kevin Ripple, a budget analyst with the state’s Office of Legislative Budget Assistant, said in an email last week.
Of the state’s $29 million, roughly $22 million will come from the general fund and $7 million will come from higher-than-expected revenue from the state’s Medicaid enhancement tax paid by hospitals, Ripple wrote.
Beyond the current year, the bill provides a formula for how such payments will be calculated through 2024.
“This agreement ensures that the State will continue to fund critical reimbursements to hospitals for the uncompensated care they provide to low income and vulnerable patients, now and in the future,” the New Hampshire Hospital Association wrote in a statement.
“Working in partnership, this agreement demonstrates the hospitals’ willingness to move forward and create financial stability for the hospitals, the Medicaid program, the State budget, and most importantly, preserve access to care for our patients who are served by their community hospitals.”
A complete list of amounts the state’s hospitals are expected to receive was not immediately available from the Department of Health and Human Services. Payments are expected to be processed this week, Jake Leon, a department spokesman, said in an email.
Nora Doyle-Burr can be reached at ndoyleburr@vnews.com or 603-727-3213.
