The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced the Medicare Advantage (MA) capitation rates and MA and Part D payment policies for calendar year 2009. The capitation rates for aged and disabled beneficiaries will increase an average 3.6%. Individual counties may see varying increases because CMS rebased the fee-for-service rates and recalibrated its risk adjustment model for 2009. The agency also announced that it will audit the medical records from a sample of MA plans to determine the accuracy of the diagnosis code information they submit. As coding errors are identified, CMS said it would reconcile payments to correct for the errors at the plan level.

The rates and policies are available at http://www.cms.hhs.gov/MedicareAdvtgSpecRateStats/ Downloads/Announcement2009.pdf.