Health Agency Finalizes Adjustment of Medicare Payment Policies

The Trump administration took a series of steps Friday to revise the Medicare program’s operations and cut down on perceived wasteful spending on skin treatments.

The 2026 Medicare Physicians Fee Schedule final rule (RIN 0938-AV50) released Friday by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services will change how the Medicare program reimburses skin substitutes.

The agency will move away from treating skin substitutes as “biologicals” for the purposes of Medicare payment. Under the new payment structure, CMS will pay for skin substitutes as “incident-to supplies,” a change that CMS expects will reduce costs on these procedures by ...