Health care administration expert witnesses may write reports and opine on rehabilitation centers, managed care organizations, medical record review, and related topics. Here, Federal News Daily reports that Tricare, the health care program serving uniformed service members, retirees and their families worldwide has few options for increasing access to civilian providers.
Tricare Management Activity is severely limited in what it can do to expand beneficiaries’ access to civilian health care providers, according to a report from the Government Accountability Office. In addition to national shortages, Tricare beneficiaries’ access also may be impeded in certain locations where there are insufficient numbers and types of civilian providers to cover the local demand.
Providers are generally leery of accepting Tricare patients because of the Tricare fee structure. Providers’ concern about Tricare’s reimbursement rates – which generally are set at Medicare rates – continues as a long-standing issue, according to the report, released June 2. The fee schedule has more recently been cited as the primary reason civilian providers will not accept Tricare Standard and Extra beneficiaries as patients, according to TMA’s surveys of civilian providers.
Read more: federaldaily.com.