Deciphering the Dollars: Advanced Medicare Cost Reporting and Appeals Strategies for 2026

Greg Etzel, Partner, Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP, and Eric Lucas, Managing Director, Baker Tilly, discuss the latest trends and developments related to Medicare cost reporting and appeals. They cover why the Medicare cost report still matters and how it has changed over the years, recent litigation surrounding the cost report, how the wage index impacts hospital reimbursement, issues related to CMS’ low wage index policy and 1985 budget neutrality adjustment, the biggest procedural traps for hospitals, and reopening old cost reports. Greg and Eric spoke about this topic at AHLA’s 2026 Institute on Medicare and Medicaid Payment Issues in Baltimore, MD.Watch this episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYR5n1JL-8ALearn more about AHLA’s 2026 Institute on Medicare and Medicaid Payment Issues: https://www.americanhealthlaw.org/medicaremedicaidLearn more about AHLA’s 2026 Medicare and Medicaid eProgram: https://educate.americanhealthlaw.org/local/catalog/view/product.php?productid=1759 Essential Legal Updates, Now in AudioAHLA's popular Health Law Daily email newsletter is now a daily podcast, exclusively for AHLA Comprehensive members. Get all your health law news from the major media outlets on this podcast! To subscribe and add this private podcast feed to your podcast app, go to americanhealthlaw.org/dailypodcast.Stay At the Forefront of Health Legal EducationLearn more about AHLA and the educational resources available to the health law community at https://www.americanhealthlaw.org/.