Ass'n Hosp. del Maestro, Inc. v. Becerra

United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
_____________________
No. 19-1475
ASOCIACIÓN HOSPITAL DEL MAESTRO, INC.; HOSPITAL ALEJANDRO
OTERO LOPEZ, a/k/a Manati Medical Center Dr. Otero Lopez;
HOSPITAL BELLA VISTA; HOSPITAL BUEN SAMARITANO, a/k/a
Hospital Comunitario Buen Samaritano; HOSPITAL DAMAS;
HOSPITAL DE LA CONCEPCIÓN; HOSPITAL DOCTOR'S CENTER;
HOSPITAL DR. CAYETANO COLL Y TOSTE; HOSPITAL DR. PEREA;
HOSPITAL EPISCOPAL CRISTO REDENTOR; HOSPITAL EPISCOPAL
SAN LUCAS I; HOSPITAL EPISCOPAL SAN LUCAS II; HOSPITAL
GENERAL MENONITA (AIBONITO); HOSPITAL GENERAL MENONITA
(CAYEY); HOSPITAL METROPOLITANO DR. TITO MATTEI, a/k/a
Hospital Pavia Yauco; HOSPITAL DR. SUSONI; HOSPITAL
METROPOLITANO RIO PIEDRAS; HOSPITAL PAVIA HATO REY;
HOSPITAL PAVIA SANTURCE; HOSPITAL RYDER MEMORIAL;
HOSPITAL SAN CARLOS BORROMEO; HOSPITAL SAN FRANCISCO;
HOSPITAL SAN PABLO; HOSPITAL SAN PABLO DEL ESTE; HOSPITAL
WILMA N. VAZQUEZ, a/k/a Centro Medico Wilma N. Vazquez,
Plaintiffs, Appellants,
v.
XAVIER BECERRA, in his official capacity as Secretary of the
United States Department of Health and Human Services*
Defendant, Appellee.
_____________________
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF PUERTO RICO
[Hon. Aida M. Delgado-Colon, U.S. District Judge]
_____________________
* Pursuant to Fed. R. App. P. 43(c)(2), Secretary of the U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services Xavier Becerra has been
substituted for former Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health
and Human Services Alex M. Azar as appellee.
Before
Howard, Chief Judge,
Barron, Circuit Judge,
and McAuliffe, District Judge.
_____________________
Robert L. Roth, with whom Hooper, Lundy & Bookman, P.C. was
on brief, for appellants.
Courtney L. Dixon, Attorney, Appellate Staff, Civil Division,
U.S. Department of Justice, with whom Joseph H. Hunt, Assistant
Attorney General, and Mark B. Stern, Attorney, Appellate Staff,
Civil Division, U.S. Department of Justice, were on brief, for
appellee.
_____________________
August 18, 2021
_____________________
 Of the District of New Hampshire, sitting by designation.
McAULIFFE, District Judge. American hospitals provide
critical medical care to many people who are uninsured,
underinsured, and otherwise unable to pay. Recognizing the
financial burden borne by those hospitals, Congress has developed
programs that aim to mitigate it. This appeal presents issues
related to the implementation of one such program.
Hospitals that provide unreimbursed care to a
disproportionate number of low-income patients are eligible, under
the Medicare Program, to receive money from the government to
partially offset the costs of providing that care. Those
government payments are known as "disproportionate share hospital
payments" or "DSH Payments." The amounts paid are calculated by
applying a multi-factor formula established by Congress.
When the DSH reimbursement program was enacted, it
covered only hospitals in the fifty states. But shortly
thereafter, in 1986, Congress included hospitals in Puerto Rico.
In doing so, Congress provided that the existing statutory formula
used to calculate DSH payments would apply to Puerto Rico hospitals
"in the same manner and to the extent" it applies to hospitals in
the states. But a problem arose, highlighted by this case: when
the statutorily prescribed reimbursement formula was applied to
hospitals in Puerto Rico, the resulting DSH payments were often
substantially less than the DSH payments provided to similarly-
situated hospitals in the states.
- 3 -
That disparity occurred because, as a "proxy" for the
number of low-income patients actually treated by a hospital, the
statutory formula counted the number of patients who were receiving
both Medicare and Supplemental Security Income ("SSI") benefits
from the Social Security Administration. But, Puerto Rico
residents, while citizens of the United States, are not eligible
for SSI benefits. Consequently, part of the formula's proxy –
patients receiving SSI benefits – not only failed to accurately
measure the number of low-income patients who received care in
Puerto Rico hospitals, but it also frequently diminished the
support hospitals in Puerto Rico received compared to similarly-
situated hospitals in every state.
Appellants are a group of 25 acute-care hospitals in
Puerto Rico that received DSH payments from the government. They
challenge the DSH payments they received from 1999 through 2006,
arguing that they should have received sums roughly equivalent to
those received by their stateside counterparts. Specifically,
they allege that the Secretary of the United States Department of
Health and Human Services improperly calculated their DSH payments
by failing to use a different proxy – one that did not include
receipt of SSI benefits - when approximating how many low-income
patients appellants had treated during the relevant period.
Before the district court, appellants challenged the
Secretary's interpretation and application of the statutory
- 4 -
formula (as well as the agency's implementing regulations),
arguing that they were inconsistent with the Medicare Act, the
Administrative Procedure Act ("APA"), and the Equal Protection
Clause of the United States Constitution. The district court
addressed each of those arguments, but in the end denied relief.
While we recognize an apparent (and perhaps unintended)
unfairness in this situation, we, like the district court,
necessarily conclude that the Secretary did not err in implementing
the statute. We also agree with the district court that the
appellant hospitals have not shown that they were the victims of
any unlawful or unconstitutional discrimination by the Secretary.
Accordingly, we affirm the district court's decision granting the
Secretary's motion for summary judgment and denying appellants'
motion for summary judgment.
I.
The material facts are not in dispute. In April of 1986,
Congress amended the Medicare Inpatient Prospective Payment System
("IPPS") to provide that hospitals serving "a significantly
disproportionate number of low-income patients" may receive a
"disproportionate share adjustment" payment. See 42 U.S.C.
§ 1395ww(d)(5)(F)(i) & (ii). DSH payments are based upon a
participating hospital's "disproportionate patient percentage"
("DPP"). Id. § 1395ww(d)(5)(F)(v) & (vi). The DPP is the sum of
two fractions designed to capture the approximate percentage of
- 5 -
low-income patients the hospital serves, on an inpatient basis, in
a given fiscal year. Only the first fraction, known as the
"Medicare/SSI fraction," is at issue here. It is defined as
follows:
the fraction (expressed as a percentage), the
numerator of which is the number of such
hospital's patient days for such period which
were made up of patients who (for such days)
were entitled to benefits under [Medicare Part
A] and were entitled to supplementary security
income [SSI] benefits (excluding any State
supplementation) under subchapter XVI of this
chapter, and the denominator of which is the
number of such hospital's patient days for
such fiscal year which were made up of
patients who (for such days) were entitled to
benefits under [Medicare Part A].
Id. § 1395ww(d)(5)(F)(vi)(I) (emphasis supplied).
As originally enacted, the program applied only to
hospitals in the fifty states and the District of Columbia.
Hospitals in the territories, including the Commonwealth of Puerto
Rico, were (and continued to be) reimbursed under an older system,
based upon "reasonable costs" incurred in providing inpatient
services to Medicare patients. Congress, however, directed the
Secretary to consider whether the territories should be included
in the new program and, in 1986, the Secretary submitted a detailed
report summarizing his findings.
With regard to Puerto Rico, the Secretary concluded that
the new payment system "appears to be compatible with the Puerto
Rico hospital system." Otis R. Bowen, U.S. Dep't of Health and
- 6 -
Hum. Servs., Report to Congress on Recommendations for Extending
Hospital Prospective Payment to Participating Hospitals Outside
the 50 States and the District of Columbia, at 1 (1986). The
Secretary's report noted, however, that even after adjusting for
lower wages, hospitals in Puerto Rico had "significantly lower"
healthcare costs than hospitals in the states – that is, hospitals
in Puerto Rico were not, strictly speaking, similarly situated to
those in the states. Id. at 2 (observing that hospitals in Puerto
Rico had been more successful in containing healthcare costs
"through more efficient use of hospital resources"; that the
"standardized cost per case in Puerto Rico is significantly lower";
and some evidence suggested that "hospital costs per admission in
Puerto Rico have not been increasing at the same rate as hospital
costs in the [states]"). The Secretary suggested that "the fact
that the [reimbursement system] would be suitable for
implementation in Puerto Rico does not mean that these hospitals
should be paid at the same level as hospitals already in the
prospective payment system. Costs in Puerto Rico hospitals are
not comparable in absolute terms to costs in U.S. hospitals." Id.
at 29. Accordingly, the Secretary recommended that Congress
establish a reimbursement rate for Puerto Rico "based on a blend
of 25 percent national Federal standardized rate and 75 percent
standardized rate for Puerto Rico." Id. at 4.
- 7 -
No doubt relying on the Secretary's Report, Congress, in
1986, enacted the Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1986, PL
99–509, § 9304 (codified as amended at 42 U.S.C. § 1395ww(d)(9)(D))
(the "Puerto Rico IPPS Statute"). That statute provides that the
"provisions" of the Medicare statute relating to disproportionate
share payments "shall apply" to Puerto Rico hospitals in the "same
manner and to the extent as they apply" to hospitals in the states.
42 U.S.C. § 1395ww(d)(9)(D) (emphases supplied). The parties
dispute the proper interpretation of the highlighted language.
The Secretary asserts that the language of the Puerto
Rico IPPS Statute is unambiguous and means precisely what it says:
to calculate the DSH payments to a Puerto Rico hospital, the
Secretary must apply the "provisions" of the statutory formula set
out in 42 U.S.C. § 1395ww(d)(5)(F)(vi)(I) "in the same manner and
to the extent" those provisions are applied to hospitals in the
states. As noted above, that formula counts the number of
inpatients who were receiving SSI benefits – a federal program for
which residents of Puerto Rico are not eligible.1
1 The United States Supreme Court recently granted
certiorari to consider whether Congress violated the Fifth
Amendment's Equal Protection Clause by establishing Supplemental
Security Income in the fifty states, the District of Columbia, and
the Northern Mariana Islands, but not extending that program to
residents of Puerto Rico. United States v. Vaello-Madero, 956
F.3d 12 (1st Cir. 2020), cert. granted, __ U.S. __, __ S.Ct. __,
__ L.Ed.2d __, 2021 WL 769690 (Mar. 1, 2021) (No. 20-303). In
this case, appellants do not assert a similar challenge to the
statutory formula's application to Puerto Rico hospitals, nor do
- 8 -
Appellants also think the statute is unambiguous, but
urge a different construction. First, they point out that
Congress's purpose in providing DSH payments to hospitals in Puerto
Rico was to compensate them for higher costs associated with
treating low-income patients. Next, they say the Secretary has
undermined that purpose by employing receipt of SSI benefits as a
proxy for quantifying low-income patients treated by hospitals in
Puerto Rico: "the Secretary's implementation of the Puerto Rico
IPPS Statute unreasonably transforms a statute that was
specifically intended to provide DSH payments to Puerto Rico
hospitals into a statute that severely limits, and in some cases
totally eliminates, such payments." Appellants' Brief at 4.
Appellants claim that by parroting the statutory language in the
implementing regulations, the Secretary has continued, rather than
remedied, the problem (this assertion forms the basis for
appellants' APA claim). In short, appellants argue that, when
calculating DSH payments for Puerto Rico hospitals, not only was
the Secretary empowered to use a proxy other than receipt of SSI
benefits, he was obligated to do so.2
they argue for a stay pending resolution of Vaello-Madero. Here,
appellants vigorously, and singularly, challenge the Secretary's
administrative implementation of the statutory formula's
"Medicare/SSI fraction."
2 Parenthetically, we note that in 1974, the scope of Title
XVI of the Social Security Act was expanded to provide SSI benefits
to residents of the states – benefits that extended beyond Title
XVI's earlier cash assistance programs for the needy, aged, blind,
- 9 -
Finally, appellants assert that the Secretary's
implementation of the statute is unfairly (and unconstitutionally)
racially discriminatory because it disproportionately burdens
Puerto Rico hospitals, residents of Puerto Rico, and staff at
appellants' hospitals, most of whom are of Hispanic descent.
Congress was not unaware of the diminished DSH payments
made to Puerto Rico hospitals. Indeed, over the years several
bills have been introduced to address that disparity. For example,
in 2004, a bill was introduced in the Senate which would have
amended the Puerto Rico IPPS Statute in precisely the manner
suggested by appellants, by substituting receipt of benefits under
Puerto Rico's cash assistance program for the aged, blind, and
disabled for receipt of SSI benefits as the proxy for low-income
patients. See Medicare DSH Payments for Puerto Rico Hospitals
Fairness Act of 2004, S.2260, 108th Cong. (2004); see also Puerto
Rico Hospitals Medicare DSH Equity Act of 2005, H.R. 4207, 109th
Cong. (2005); Puerto Rico Hospitals Medicare DSH Equity Act of
2007, H.R. 616, 110th Cong. (2007); Puerto Rico Hospitals Medicare
and disabled. Residents of Puerto Rico, however, are not eligible
for SSI benefits. Instead, they continue to be eligible for the
cash assistance programs that preceded SSI. But, say appellants,
anyone eligible for Puerto Rico's cash assistance program would
also qualify for SSI benefits if they lived in one of the fifty
states. Thus, appellants argue that when dealing with residents
of Puerto Rico, the receipt of cash assistance under Titles I, X,
XIV, and XVI of the Social Security Act is a more appropriate and
equitable proxy for low-income patients treated than is receipt of
SSI benefits.
- 10 -
DSH Equity Act of 2009, H.R. 1502, 111th Cong. (2009). None of
those bills was enacted into law.
II.
We review a district court's grant of summary judgment
de novo. Irish v. Fowler, 979 F.3d 65, 73 (1st Cir. 2020). In
doing so, we read the facts in the light most favorable to the
non-prevailing party (here, the hospitals), granting all
reasonable inferences in their favor. Id.A.
We think the statutory language at issue is neither
ambiguous nor open to plausible differing interpretations. When
establishing the DSH payment program, Congress devised a plain and
understandable (if complex) formula that employs receipt of SSI
benefits as one factor to approximate the unreimbursed costs
incurred by hospitals in treating low-income patients. 42 U.S.C.
§ 1395ww(d)(5)(F)(vi)(I). When Congress subsequently admitted
Puerto Rico hospitals into that program, it made clear that the
existing "provisions" (including their use of the "Medicare/SSI
fraction") "shall apply" to Puerto Rico hospitals "in the same
manner and to the extent" they apply to similarly-situated
hospitals in the states. Id. § 1395ww(d)(9)(D). The parties do
not dispute the plain meaning of the statute's terms "manner"
(which appellants define as "process" or "a characteristic or
customary mode of acting"), or "extent" (which appellants define
- 11 -
as "the range over which something extends"). Appellants' Brief
at 37 n.4, 38 n.5. Instead, their dispute centers on the
appellants' contention that the "natural reading" of the statutory
provision as a whole "is that DSH payments for Puerto Rico
hospitals should be calculated using the same process that is used
to calculate DSH payments for hospitals in the States" and that
"DSH payments should be as available to Puerto Rico hospitals as
they are to hospitals in the States." Appellants' Brief at 37-38
(emphasis supplied). Appellants further contend that the
Secretary has violated this putative statutory command insofar as
"the Secretary excludes all low-income Puerto Rico resident
Medicare beneficiaries [from counting under the SSI fraction] but
does not exclude all low-income Medicare beneficiaries from any
State [from so counting]," as this, appellants claim, signifies
that "DSH payments are not available to Puerto Rico hospitals 'to
the extent' as hospitals in the States." Id. at 38 (emphasis
supplied).
But, as the Secretary points out, Appellee's Brief at
20, the statute directs that specified "provisions . . . relating
to disproportionate share payments," 42 U.S.C. § 1395ww(d)(9)(D)
(emphasis supplied), "shall apply" to Puerto Rico hospitals "in
the same manner and to the extent as they apply" to other U.S.
hospitals, id., and not that "DSH payments" should be so
"appl[ied]." Thus, we agree with the Secretary that it is the
- 12 -
appellants' reading which conflicts with the plain text of the
statute, because, among other difficulties, adopting it would
require us to replace the word that Congress actually employed -
"provisions" - with appellants' preferred terminology. See, e.g.,
United States v. Flores, 968 F.2d 1366, 1371 (1st Cir. 1992)
("Courts should not lightly read . . . clauses out of statutes,
but should, to the exact contrary, attempt to give meaning to each
word and phrase."). The Secretary's regulatory implementation of
those statutory provisions was entirely consistent with Congress's
mandate.
But, say appellants, the Secretary's use of the
"Medicare/SSI fraction" and its "SSI benefits proxy" undermines
the purpose of the DSH payment program, and is plainly inconsistent
with congressional intent. Those factors, they argue, compelled
the Secretary to enact regulations that employ a different, more
appropriate proxy or metric - one that took into account the
reality that SSI benefits are not paid to residents of Puerto Rico.
While we understand the hospitals' perspective, and
appreciate the economic disadvantages they describe, their claim
to legal relief necessarily falls short. First, Congress was aware
that its use of this "proxy" in the statutory DSH formula was just
that. See H.R. Rep. No. 99-241, at 17 (1985) (Conf. Rep.)
(explaining that Congress was using in the DSH formula "a proxy
measure for low income" - substantially because "[t]he Committee
- 13 -
did not want to impose any additional administrative requirements
on hospitals or patients" - and it was aware that its "proxy
measure of low-income status might substantially understate the
presence of low-income patients in some hospitals").
Moreover, Congress spoke in unambiguous terms and the
Secretary (and this court) must give effect to its clear
instructions. See Chevron, U.S.A., Inc. v. Nat'l Res. Def.
Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842–43, 104 S. Ct. 2778, 2781–82, 81
L. Ed. 2d 694 (1984); see also Maine Med. Ctr. v. Burwell, 841
F.3d 10, 21–22 (1st Cir. 2016) (discussing the Chevron analysis in
the context of reviewing the Secretary's interpretation of DSH
payment calculations similar to those at issue in this case).
Critically, Congress did not vest the Secretary with authority to
employ other, likely more accurate or equitable, proxies when
calculating DSH payments to Puerto Rico hospitals. Indeed,
Congress explicitly required the Secretary to apply precisely the
same specified provisions it had established for calculating DSH
payments to hospitals in the states.
The Secretary's implementation of the Puerto Rico IPPS
Statute does not run afoul of the Act itself, and the implementing
regulations were not enacted in violation of the Administrative
Procedure Act. Even if the Secretary had been convinced that a
different proxy would have been more suitable, more equitable, or
even more effective in carrying out Congress's overall purposes
- 14 -
than the language Congress actually enacted, the Secretary was
powerless to substitute his judgment or language for that of the
Congress. That is true even if straying from the clear statutory
language might be thought to be better policy or might actually
better serve the underlying purpose of the DSH payment program.
See Cent. Bank of Denver, N.A. v. First Interstate Bank of Denver,
N.A., 511 U.S. 164, 188, 114 S. Ct. 1439, 1453–54, 128 L. Ed. 2d
119 (1994). If Congress mistakenly imposed requirements that
resulted in unintended lower payments to hospitals in Puerto Rico,
Congress could, of course, have remedied that mistake. The
Secretary, however, could not. See Util. Air Regul. Grp. v.
E.P.A., 573 U.S. 302, 325–26, 134 S. Ct. 2427, 2445, 189 L. Ed. 2d
372 (2014) ("An agency has no power to 'tailor' legislation to
bureaucratic policy goals by rewriting unambiguous statutory
terms. Agencies exercise discretion only in the interstices
created by statutory silence or ambiguity; they must always give
effect to the unambiguously expressed intent of Congress."
quotation omitted); Chevron, 467 U.S. at 842-43, 104 S. Ct. 2778,
2781 ("If the intent of Congress is clear, that is the end of the
matter; for the court, as well as the agency, must give effect to
the unambiguously expressed intent of Congress."). Cf. Mistretta
v. United States, 488 U.S. 361, 372–73, 109 S. Ct. 647, 654–55,
102 L. Ed. 2d 714 (1989) (discussing the circumstances under which
- 15 -
Congress can delegate rule-making authority to an executive
agency).
B.
Appellants' Equal Protection arguments fare no better.
The hospitals assert that the Secretary's "interpretation" of 42
U.S.C. §§ 1395ww(d)(5) and (9) amounts to arbitrary, irrational,
and impermissible racial discrimination targeting the hospitals
and their predominantly Puerto Rican patients. Appellants' Brief
at 49. But, appellants' real difficulty is not with the
Secretary's exercise of discretion in his implementation of the
statute, but rather with the unambiguous statutory provisions
themselves (as noted earlier, appellants do not challenge the
statutory provisions as being violative of the Equal Protection
Clause).
Moreover, nothing in the record suggests that either the
statutory or regulatory scheme at issue was the product of any
racially discriminatory intent or purpose. See, e.g., Vill. of
Arlington Heights v. Metro. Hous. Dev. Corp., 429 U.S. 252, 264-
65, 97 S. Ct. 555, 563, 50 L. Ed. 2d 450 (1977) ("[O]fficial action
will not be held unconstitutional solely because it results in a
racially disproportionate impact. Disproportionate impact is not
irrelevant, but it is not the sole touchstone of an invidious
racial discrimination. Proof of racially discriminatory intent or
purpose is required to show a violation of the Equal Protection
- 16 -
Clause."); Washington v. Davis, 426 U.S. 229, 240, 96 S. Ct. 2040,
2048, 48 L. Ed. 2d 597 (1976) ("[T]he basic equal protection
principle [is] that the invidious quality of a law claimed to be
racially discriminatory must ultimately be traced to a racially
discriminatory purpose.").
III.
In an effort to more fully and faithfully implement what
they see as congressional intent behind certain aspects of 42
U.S.C. § 1395ww(d), appellants essentially ask this court to
ignore the unambiguous language used in the statute. In their
view, the Puerto Rico IPPS Statute requires "DSH payments to be
made to Puerto Rico hospitals in the same manner and to the extent
that those payments are made to hospitals in the States."
Appellants' Brief at 15 (emphasis supplied). But, that is not
what the statute says. Rather, it requires the Secretary to apply
the "provisions" of the statute to "Puerto Rico hospitals receiving
payment under this paragraph in the same manner and to the extent
as they apply to" hospitals in the states. That is precisely what
the Secretary has done for roughly 30 years, without congressional
correction. Uniformly applying those statutory provisions, as
directed, may well have worked to the financial disadvantage of
hospitals in Puerto Rico. But the remedy for such a disadvantage
lies with Congress. The Secretary, however, remained obligated to
implement the law as Congress directed.
- 17 -
For the foregoing reasons, the district court's decision
is necessarily affirmed.
- 18 -