(1) The department makes small rural disproportionate share hospital (SRDSH) payments to qualifying small rural hospitals.
To qualify for an SRDSH payment, a hospital must:
(a) Not be a peer group E hospital;
(b) Meet the criteria in WAC
388-550-4900(5);
(c) Have fewer than seventy-five acute licensed beds; and
(d) Be an in-state hospital. A hospital located out-of-state or in a designated bordering city is not eligible to receive SRDSH payments;
(2) In addition, for the SRDSH program to be implemented for state fiscal year (SFY) 2008, which begins on July 1, 2007, the city or town must have a nonstudent population of no more than seventeen thousand one hundred fifteen in calendar year 2006, as determined by the Washington state office of financial management estimate.
For each subsequent SFY, the nonstudent population ceiling is increased cumulatively by two percent.
(3) The department pays hospitals qualifying for SRDSH payments from a legislatively appropriated pool. The department determines each hospital's individual SRDSH payment from the total dollars in the pool using percentages established as follows:
(a) At the time the SRDSH payment is to be made, the department calculates each hospital's profitability margin based on the hospital's base year data and audited financial statements.
(b) The department determines the average profitability margin for the qualifying hospitals.
(c) Any hospital with a profitability margin of less than one hundred ten percent of the average profitability margin for qualifying hospitals receives a profit factor of 1.1. All other hospitals receive a profit factor of 1.0.
(d) The department:
(i) Identifies the medicaid payment amounts made by the department to the individual hospital during the SFY two years prior to the current SFY for which DSH application is being made. These medicaid payment amounts are based on historical data considered to be complete; then
(ii) Multiplies the total medicaid payment amount determined in subsection (i) by the individual hospital's assigned profit factor (1.1 or 1.0) to identify a revised medicaid payment amount; and
(iii) Divides the revised medicaid payment amount for the individual hospital by the sum of the revised medicaid payment amounts for all qualifying hospitals during the same period.
(4) The department's SRDSH payments to a hospital may not exceed one hundred percent of the projected cost of care for medicaid clients and uninsured patients for that hospital unless an exception is required by federal statute or regulation.
(5) The department reallocates dollars as defined in the state plan.
[Statutory Authority: RCW 74.08.090, 74.09.500. 07-14-090, § 388-550-5200, filed 6/29/07, effective 8/1/07; 06-08-046, § 388-550-5200, filed 3/30/06, effective 4/30/06. Statutory Authority: RCW 74.08.090, 74.04.050, and 2003 1st sp.s. c 25. 04-12-044, § 388-550-5200, filed 5/28/04, effective 7/1/04. Statutory Authority: RCW 74.08.090, 74.09.500, 74.09.035(1), and 43.88.290. 03-13-055, § 388-550-5200, filed 6/12/03, effective 7/13/03. Statutory Authority: RCW 74.08.090, 74.09.730, chapter 74.46 RCW and 42 U.S.C. 1396r-4. 99-14-025, § 388-550-5200, filed 6/28/99, effective 7/1/99. Statutory Authority: RCW 74.08.090, 74.09.730, 74.04.050, 70.01.010, 74.09.200, [74.09.]500, [74.09.]530 and 43.20B.020. 98-01-124, § 388-550-5200, filed 12/18/97, effective 1/18/98.]