“On the congressional side, we are obviously still hoping for an extension,” Rikki Cheung, senior director of Moving Health Home, said in an interview before the government shut down. “Hospital at home has two vehicles right now. They have the congressional continuing resolution, so the government funding vehicle, and obviously, as you’ve seen, the Republicans and Democrats have different time frames for that. And then, relatedly, there’s a standalone bill, the Buchanan bill, that the House Ways and Means advanced, which is a five-year extension.”

Cheung said some congressional staff have expressed a desire to separate the hospital at home legislation from the CR and fast track its passage. The AHCaH waiver does not add any additional cost to the Medicare program, which makes an extension easier to pass, Cheung said.

“This would be good because then hospital home will be extended for a longer period of time, for five years,” she explained. “And also it’s not limping along with the continuing resolution extensions. The con is that it’s not really attached to a must-pass vehicle, like the government has to get funded. And so it’s a little bit on its own there, and so it’ll be up to leadership to decide whether it goes on the floor. But it sounds like, from all the discussion, that hospital at home is a pretty bipartisan priority for everyone.”

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