STAR Act

Key Points

• This bill changes how Medicare pays long-term care hospitals for patients who stay a long time. It extends lower payment rates for some services through 2032 to help the government save money.
• It creates a new way for hospitals to get higher payments if they treat very sick patients with complex medical needs. These patients must have come from a regular hospital and have a high medical severity score.
• The bill also allows hospitals to get higher payments for patients who were on ventilators or in intensive care at smaller rural hospitals. Currently, this mostly applies to patients coming from larger city hospitals.
• These changes would start on October 1, 2026. Only hospitals that are already open or currently being built would be able to use these new payment rules to get the higher rates.

Impact Analysis

Govbase has not yet run an impact analysis on this legislation.