Dive Brief:
The Democratic and Republican leadership of three House committees and one Senate committee said on Friday they agreed on a method to resolve surprise medical bills, increasing the chances a fix is included in year-end funding legislation Congress is hustling to finalize this week.
Under the proposal, disagreements between health insurers and providers on how much to pay for surprise medical bills would be settled by an independent arbiter. The approach is favored by providers, while insurers had advocated for tying payments to median in-network rates, a strategy called benchmarking.
Passage of the deal is by no means assured, however, and payers are continuing to lobby Congress to tweak it.