The department of health and welfare is authorized to seek and shall submit a state plan amendment by July 1, 2026, that sets reimbursement rates for hospital-acquired physician practices at the same rate as physician-owned medical practices for all equivalent outpatient health services where the service is not dependent on the hospital facility’s associated technologies and in the absence of any evidence-based rationale. The department shall except critical access hospitals and rural emergency hospitals to the extent allowable.

[56-2207, added 2025, ch. 118, sec. 2, p. 624.]