Health services research and policy
Opinion
Anticipated Impact of the 2016 Federal Election on Federal Health Care Legislation

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The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA; also known as Obamacare) was the signature legislation of President Obama’s first term 8, 9. It was passed without any Republicans voting in its favor in either legislative branch, and in the ensuing years and three election cycles, it has been a unifying point of attack by the Republican Party [10]. Consequently, both the incoming Congress and White House administration have expressed their commitment to effectively repeal PPACA shortly

Authority Over Physician Practice and Payment

The Obama administration saw the advent of a range of measures shifting authority over physician practice and payment to the executive branch of the federal government. The new administration is likely to pursue a range of measures that would oppose this trend, instead shifting power back toward the federal legislative branch, if not to the individual states themselves. Such efforts would be aligned with a desire by incoming Secretary Price to support physicians’ autonomy and lower perceived

The Transition to Value-Based Care

The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA), passed in 2015 [28], represents the most influential piece of health care legislation since PPACA 6, 7. MACRA stabilized the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule by repealing the sustainable growth rate. In the process, MACRA also implemented a new system, subsequently named the Quality Payment Program (QPP), that will greatly reform the Medicare payment system to base a substantial fraction of Medicare payments on the quality and cost of

Tort Reform

Medical malpractice tort reform also stands to be altered given the election results. The Republican Party has a long-standing record of supporting such reform [33], for example supporting bills during previous administrations that set caps on compensation for noneconomic damages. In addition, prior legislation introduced by Price included a number of tort reform provisions, including a cap on noneconomic damages, a shortened window for filing suits, and administrative tribunals to evaluate new

Conclusions

We acknowledge that these predictions reflect our perceptions of the most likely federal provisions and agencies to be affected under the new regime. Ultimately, patients, payers, and radiologists and other physicians alike, will need to closely follow the federal health policy landscape once the next administration assumes power in January 2017.

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  • Dr Rosenkrantz is supported by a research grant from the Harvey L. Neiman Health Policy Institute. Dr Hirsch has received fees unrelated to the present work from Medtronic, Carefusion, and Codman Neurovascular. The authors have no conflicts of interest related to the material discussed in this article.

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