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To amend title XVIII of the Social Security Act to codify the Medicare low-wage index hospital policy.
Summary
The bill amends Medicare payment rules to codify a wage index adjustment policy for hospitals located in low-wage areas. Hospitals with area wage index values below the 25th percentile nationally would receive an increased Medicare payment rate, with the adjustment equal to half the difference between their current wage index and the 25th percentile wage index. The adjustment is implemented in a budget-neutral manner to avoid increasing total Medicare payments. Protections are included to prevent other hospitals with wage indexes below the 75th percentile from experiencing decreases and to ensure no hospital's wage index declines below 95 percent of its prior year value. The policy applies to hospital discharges beginning October 1, 2019.
AI-generated plain-language summary of the bill text — neutral, and may be imperfect. See the full text below for the exact wording.
Sponsor (1)
- Sen. Warner, Mark R. [D-VA] (D-VA)
6 cosponsors
- Sen. Blackburn, Marsha [R-TN] (R-TN)
- Sen. Boozman, John [R-AR] (R-AR)
- Sen. Hagerty, Bill [R-TN] (R-TN)
- Sen. Hyde-Smith, Cindy [R-MS] (R-MS)
- Sen. Tuberville, Tommy [R-AL] (R-AL)
- Sen. Wicker, Roger F. [R-MS] (R-MS)
Actions (2)
- Mar 26, 2026 Read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance. · senate
- Mar 26, 2026 Introduced in Senate
Similar bills (6)
Bills with similar text or summary — includes reintroductions across Congresses. Ranked by semantic similarity of the bill text (computed locally); a neutral discovery aid, not a claim the bills are duplicates.
Full text
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES
March 26, 2026
Mr. Warner (for himself, Mrs. Blackburn, Mrs. Hyde-Smith, and Mr. Tuberville) introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Finance
A BILL
To amend title XVIII of the Social Security Act to codify the Medicare low-wage index hospital policy.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the “Save Struggling Hospitals Act”.
SEC. 2. CODIFICATION OF THE MEDICARE LOW-WAGE INDEX HOSPITAL POLICY.
Section 1886(d)(3)(E) of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1395ww(d)(3)(E)) is amended—
(1) in clause (i), in the first sentence, by striking “or
(iv)” and inserting “, (iv), or (v)”; and
(2) by adding at the end the following new clause:
“(v) Area wage index adjustment for low- wage hospitals.—
“(I) In general.—For discharges occurring on or after October 1, 2019, the area wage index applicable under this subparagraph for a fiscal year to a hospital with an area wage index (determined without regard to this clause) below the 25th percentile area wage index shall be increased by \1/2\ of the difference between the otherwise applicable final area wage index for such fiscal year for such hospital and the 25th percentile area wage index for such fiscal year across all hospitals.
“(II) Budget neutrality.— Pursuant to the fourth sentence of clause (i), this clause shall be applied in a budget neutral manner. Any adjustments made for the purposes of such application of budget neutrality may not— “(aa) decrease the area wage index applicable under this subparagraph to a hospital with an area wage index (determined without regard to this clause) below the 75th percentile area wage index for the fiscal year; or “(bb) result in an area wage index applicable under this subparagraph to a hospital for such fiscal year that is less than 95 percent of the area wage index applicable under this subparagraph to such hospital for the preceding fiscal year.”. <all>
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