Hospital executives have met with lawmakers in Washington, D.C., and expressed concerns over losing insured patients and revenue under an ACA replacement plan, reports The Wall Street Journal.
Here are four things to know.
1. Hospital executives have said they do not want Americans to lose insurance under any Republican ACA replacement plan, according to the article. But if that happens, the report states, they want Congress to restore billions of dollars in federal funding they lost with the ACA.
2. This federal funding — which the Congressional Budget Office estimated would total $232 billion through the first decade of the ACA — includes disproportionate share payments for some hospitals to help them care for uninsured and low-income patients, according to the report. It also includes annual raises the federal government paid hospitals for treating Medicare patients.
3. The report notes hospitals lost this federal funding with the belief the ACA would make up for the cuts by providing hospitals with more insured patients.
4. "If you're going to repeal the Affordable Care Act, we need to have the cuts repealed as well," William Carpenter, CEO of Brentwood, Tenn.-based LifePoint Health, said during a San Francisco healthcare conference in January, according to the report.
For more on this story, read the full WSJ report here.