Wyoming Senator receives ‘Champion of the 50+’ Award

AARP has announced U.S. Senator Mike Enzi as a recipient of the 2016 “Champion of the 50+” legislative leadership award for his significant achievements during the 114 ^th Congress that benefit the lives of the 50+ and our families.

Enzi received his award for preserving seniors’ access to healthcare with his sponsorship and support in the passage of the Notice of Observation, Treatment and Implication for Care Eligibility (NOTICE) Act. The law requires hospitals to provide meaningful written and oral explanation to patients who are in the hospital “under observation” for more than 24 hours.

 “The work of Senator Enzi will help ensure that those who go to a hospital receive adequate explanations for their treatment, which has the potential to save them thousands of dollars in charges,” Sam Shumway, AARP Wyoming State Director, said. “This is especially important to families who often must come to hospitals in a time of crisis. Thanks to Enzi’s bipartisan leadership, the NOTICE Act will help families navigate the health care system more easily during what can be a traumatic time.”

One of the biggest impacts of the act is that it will help individuals be informed about whether their treatment after a hospital stay will be covered by Medicare. Under current law, Medicare will only cover post-acute care in a skilled nursing facility (SNF) if the beneficiary had three consecutive days of hospitalization as an inpatient.

Many hospitals, however, are not admitting beneficiaries as inpatients, but instead classify them under “outpatient observation” for billing purposes, even though these patients may spend multiple nights in the hospital and receive the same type and level of care as inpatients.

This means that Medicare will not cover post-acute SNF care for these “outpatient observation” patients after they are discharged from the hospital, which can result in thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket costs for those Medicare beneficiaries.