[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 7]
[House]
[Page 9495]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                         MEDICARE REIMBURSEMENT

  (Ms. BERKLEY asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. BERKLEY. Mr. Speaker, the time has come for this Congress to come 
to grips with the serious crisis in our health care system, the 
reimbursement of our doctors for treating our Medicare patients. Unless 
we act, there will be a 21 percent cut in Medicare reimbursement to 
those doctors that treat our senior citizens.
  We are in danger of creating a situation that may very well cause the 
collapse of our Medicare system. I favor a permanent fix; that's what 
we promised the doctors. We are now considering a 19-month fix. I'm not 
happy with it; I'm going to support it. Let everybody in this House 
vote for that Medicare reimbursement fix for the doctors so they can 
continue to treat senior citizens until we figure out a way of 
permanently fixing this discrepancy.
  Unless we're prepared to go to medical school and go back home to our 
districts to treat our senior citizens, we better make sure that our 
doctors get adequately reimbursed so this system will continue.

                          ____________________