Urge Congress to Stop Planned Medicare Cuts for 2022

As we continue to face the financial pressures caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, specialty providers—including physical, occupational, and speech therapists—have additional, potentially devastating Medicare cuts ahead of them.

In December 2020, lawmakers passed bipartisan legislation to ease large funding cuts to specialty providers scheduled to go into effect in 2021, which they reduced from -9% to -3%. However, the additional cuts in the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (PFS) are still scheduled to go into effect over the next several years, threatening patients’ access to care, as well as physical therapy practices’ ability to operate.

These funding cuts are even more consequential in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic as specialty providers have seen expenses rise and revenue fall over the past year. In fact, physical therapy has seen one of the steepest declines of any healthcare specialty in PFS spending during 2020— a stunning 34% decrease. Congress must ensure that Medicare patients have access to essential healthcare services that keep them moving and ease their pain by addressing the structural problems with the Medicare payment system.

We need your help raising awareness about funding cuts to physical therapy and more than 30 other specialty providers. Submit a letter to the editor of your local newspaper urging Congress to block additional Medicare cuts to specialty care!