26:2H-18.59i Reimbursed documented charity care; charity care subsidy formula after July 1, 2004.

3. a. Beginning July 1, 2004 and each year thereafter:

(1) Reimbursed documented charity care shall be equal to the Medicaid-priced amounts of charity care claims submitted to the Department of Health for the most recent calendar year, adjusted, as necessary, to reflect the annual audit results. These amounts shall be augmented to reflect payments to hospitals by the Medicaid program for Graduate Medical Education and Indirect Medical Education based on the most recent Graduate Medical Education and Indirect Medical Education formulas utilized by the federal Medicare program.

(2) Hospital-specific reimbursed documented charity care shall be equal to the Medicaid-priced dollar amount of charity care provided by a hospital as submitted to the Department of Health for the most recent calendar year. A sample of the claims submitted by the hospital to the department shall be subject to an annual audit conducted pursuant to applicable charity care eligibility criteria.

b. Beginning July 1, 2004 and each year thereafter, the charity care subsidy shall be determined according to the following methodology:

(1) Each hospital shall be ranked in order of its hospital-specific, relative charity care percentage, or RCCP, by dividing the amount of hospital-specific gross revenue for charity care patients by the hospital's total gross revenue for all patients.

(2) The nine hospitals with the highest RCCPs shall receive a charity care payment equal to 96% of each hospital's hospital-specific reimbursed documented charity care. The hospital ranked number 10 shall receive a charity care payment equal to 94% of its hospital-specific reimbursed documented charity care, and each hospital ranked number 11 and below shall receive two percentage points less than the hospital ranked immediately above that hospital.

(3) Notwithstanding the provisions of paragraph (2) of this subsection to the contrary, each of the hospitals located in the 10 municipalities in the State with the lowest median annual household income according to the most recent census data, shall be ranked from the hospital with the highest hospital-specific reimbursed documented charity care to the hospital with the lowest hospital-specific reimbursed documented charity care. The hospital in each of the 10 municipalities, if any, with the highest documented hospital-specific charity care shall receive a charity care payment equal to 96% of its hospital-specific reimbursed documented charity care.

(4) Notwithstanding the provisions of this subsection to the contrary, no hospital shall receive reimbursement for less than 43% of its hospital-specific reimbursed documented charity care.

c. To ensure that charity care subsidy payments remain viable and appropriate, the State shall maintain the charity care subsidy at an amount not less than 75% of the Medicaid-priced amounts of charity care provided by hospitals in the State. In addition, these amounts shall be augmented to reflect payments to hospitals by the Medicaid program for Graduate Medical Education and Indirect Medical Education based on the most recent Graduate Medical Education and Indirect Medical Education formulas utilized by the federal Medicare program.

d. Notwithstanding any other provisions of this section to the contrary, in the event that the change from the charity care subsidy formula in effect for fiscal year 2004 to the formula established pursuant to this section in effect for fiscal year 2005, reduces, for any reason, the amount of the charity care subsidy payment to a hospital below the amount that the hospital received under the formula in effect in fiscal year 2004, the hospital shall receive a payment equal to the amount it would have received under the formula in effect for fiscal year 2004.

L.2004, c.113, s.3; amended 2012, c.17, s.229.