Phil Gingrey: “The physicians, the chart that Dr. Price is showing, is a clear indication that, as he points out, Mr. Speaker, the cost…”

“The physicians, the chart that Dr. Price is showing, is a clear indication that, as he points out, Mr. Speaker, the cost of doing business, in this instance, the business of providing medical care to our seniors especially, continues to go up, as does the cost of doing business in any other profession. Yet the reimbursement is not even staying level. Our physicians, our providers, are not just running in place, they are losing ground each and every year, and that therefore the need is to try to fix this ultimately on a permanent basis by eliminating this flawed formula, this so-called SGR way of reimbursing our providers. But at this point we have to do something about the scheduled 5.1 percent decrease update, a loss of reimbursement for the fiscal year, or calendar year 2007. And we have a very short period of time to do this.”