Medicare Rumor Debunked

Peoplehoping for changes in Medicare are alleging that the program is sufferingbecause of the small amounts of money from the government. As a result, many believethat doctors are not willing to serve Medicare patients. These concerns havebeen voiced for years and commonly exaggerated.

Theserumors have been demolished by new analysis completed by experts at the Departmentof Health and Human Services. The analysts compiled seven years worth of dataand found that the percentage of doctors taking new Medicare patients has risenfrom 87.9% in 2005 to 90.7% in 2012. Additionally, Medicare patients havecomparable even better access to medical services. Despite these statistics, asmall number of doctors have dropped out of Medicare program. About 9,500practicing doctors have opted out of the Medicare program. However, thepercentage of doctors opting out of Medicare is small in comparison to thosewho are have decided to continue to take Medicare patients. Moreover, there arethousands of non- doctor providers that supplement them as well.

See The Editorial Board Doctors and Their Medicare Patients, New York Times,  Aug. 31, 2013.

Special thanks to Brian Cohan (Attorney at Law, Law Offices of Brian J. Cohan, P.C.) for bringing this article to my attention.