Episode
EMS shutdown survival: What leaders need to know now
- Podcast
- EMS One-Stop
- Published
- Oct 10, 2025
- Duration seconds
- 1980
- Processing state
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Summary
From Medicare cuts to billing delays, Asbel Montes joins Rob Lawrence to share practical strategies EMS agencies can use to weather the reimbursement storm In this episode of the EMS One-Stop podcast, we tackle the fast-moving realities of a federal shutdown and what it means for EMS finance, reimbursement and day-to-day operations. Rob Lawrence sits down with Solutions Group’s Asbel Montes — a veteran of EMS reimbursement and policy expertise — to decode where Congress is (and isn’t), what CMS’s temporary claims hold really means, and how ambulance services can protect cash flow while preparing for potential reprocessing chaos if extenders aren’t promptly restored. Beyond the headlines, Montes lays out a pragmatic playbook: build a Plan B for cash continuity, align with your billing team on reprocessing workflows, and model exposure across payers tied to the Medicare fee schedule. The conversation then widens to balance billing — why federal change is unlikely soon and why state-level action is delivering practical protections — before closing with leadership lessons on adaptation, data and telling EMS’s story as a guide, not the hero. Memorable quotes from Asbel Montes “Our extender expired — that’s that additional payment that we get from Medicare of that 2%, 3%, 22.6% — it expired September the 30th, and it was tied to the House-approved CR that went over to the Senate.” “We’re solutions givers, as we say here at Solutions Group, not crisis managers. And if you have a plan, I can at least execute a plan.” “What turned out to be a smaller amount, now the cost associated with it, you started to really understand the complexities that really happened in people’s AR.” “If this lasts longer than 15 days … then I would basically have a plan in place. So I would be trying…