AAMC Statement on CY 2026 Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System Final Rule

• Press Release

The AAMC issued the following statement on the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services' (CMS) Calendar Year (CY) 2026 Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System (OPPS) final rule:

"The AAMC strongly opposes provisions in CMS' final CY 2026 hospital OPPS rule that will negatively impact academic health systems and teaching hospitals' ability to care for patients.

We are deeply concerned about the cuts to Medicare outpatient hospital payment, including so-called 'site-neutral policies,' which will disproportionately impact AAMC-member health systems and teaching hospitals and harm their ability to care for the most complex patients. The rule also adds administrative and regulatory burden on providers, running counter to the administration's goal of reducing unnecessary regulation. While we appreciate the delay to the accelerated clawback of billions of dollars tied to unlawful 340B cuts by one year, we remain wary that these devastating cuts may be implemented at the beginning of 2027.

Academic medicine's four mission areas (clinical care, medical education, biomedical research, and community collaboration) are so deeply interconnected that insufficient financing or reductions in support for one mission area in turn limit the effectiveness of the others. When reimbursements to teaching health systems and hospitals and faculty practices are cut, support for all areas decreases. When we weaken the institutions that train our doctors and care for our communities, we put American families at risk. Supporting academic medicine is how we safeguard the health and well-being of patients across the country."