(Reuters) – The U.S. Supreme Court deserted on Tuesday a bid by a organisation of 18 hospitals to free a specialized organisation of Medicare remuneration claims that are adult to 25 years old.
The hospitals, that are entitled to additional remuneration for treating a vast series of low-income patients, claimed a Centers for Medicare Medicaid Services miscalculated those payments between 1987 and 1994.
The hospitals formed their explain on a apart lawsuit that found in 2006 that a Centers for Medicare Medicaid Services used a injured routine to establish a series of low-income patients treated by hospitals. The distortion resulted in underpayments, a hospitals said.
When a hospitals appealed a payments, however, a agency’s Provider Reimbursement Review Board deserted many of a claims as too old. In 2006, shortly after a lawsuit unprotected a calculation mistake, a hospitals sued for a correct reimbursements.
The supervision argued a hospitals missed their event to plea a payments since a Medicare law imposes a six-month extent for appeals. Although a examination house could have extended that deadline adult to 3 years for “good cause,†a hospitals filed their claims some-more than 10 years after a 6 month deadline expired.
The hospitals pronounced it was astray to levy a deadline underneath a circumstances, alleging a group knew about and unsuccessful to divulge a calculation errors.
The district justice sided with a government, though a U.S. Court of Appeals for a District of Columbia Circuit topsy-turvy a preference in 2011. The supervision appealed to a Supreme Court, that listened verbal arguments in a box in December.
The high court, in a unanimous statute on Tuesday, found a hospitals had missed their event to appeal. Relaxing a deadline would “essentially gut†a requirement that an interest be filed within 6 months, or 3 years for good cause, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote for a court.
Robert Roth, a counsel for a hospitals, pronounced there was a “big problem†with a decision.
“It leaves providers but a pill where they could not have famous there was a problem with their Medicare remuneration until after their time for interest had passed,†he said.
It is now adult to Congress to residence that unfairness, he added.
The Justice Department did not immediately yield a comment.
Mark Polston, a former Centers for Medicare Medicaid Services counsel now during King Spalding, pronounced a statute for a hospitals could have increasing significantly a government’s bearing to claims for past remuneration errors.
The box is Sebelius v. Auburn Regional Medical Center, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 11-1231.
(Reporting By Terry Baynes in New York.; Editing by Eileen Daspin and Andre Grenon)
