Newly Proposed Cuts are Dire for Home Health. Congress Must Act.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recently released the Home Health Prospective Payment System (“HHPPS”) Proposed Rule for Calendar Year (CY) 2025. In the Proposed Rule, CMS is planning a permanent -4.067 percent payment cut to home health services.

This is the third consecutive year that CMS has proposed cuts that make it significantly harder for home health providers to meet the care demands for an increasingly complex and aging patient population.

In total, the permanent and temporary cuts are now estimated to reduce home health payments by more than $25 billion over the next ten years.The cuts so far, and the billions in future cuts that CMS intends to implement in the years ahead, are deep and destabilizing.

Demand for home healthcare services is up, yet patient access to home health is already declining, with 500,000 fewer patients receiving care through the Medicare home health program this year compared to 2019. As an increasing number of Medicare patients become eligible for services, home healthcare should be on the rise, not declining. The ability to deliver highly skilled care at home, where patients overwhelmingly prefer to receive care, is negatively impacted by cuts that have targeted home health since 2020.

The home health community must come together to protect this vital Medicare benefit. Fortunately, a group of bipartisan lawmakers are answering the call.

Senators Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and Susan Collins (R-ME) and Representatives Terri Sewell (AL-7) and Adrian Smith (NE-3) introduced the Preserving Access to Home Health Act (S.2137/H.R. 5159), which would safeguard access to essential home-based, clinically advanced healthcare services for America’s older adults and people living with disabilities by preventing any further rate cuts.

It is imperative that Congress pass this legislation to protect older Americans access to home health—and we need your help to make this happen.

Please send an email to your lawmakers today urging them to co-sponsor S. 2137/H.R. 5159.