The chairman of the Senate Finance Committee met with lobbyists for various physicians’ groups Friday to seek their support for a “modest” plan to stop an upcoming cut in Medicare payments to doctors.

Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., said he is proposing to blocked the scheduled rate cuts for 18 months. He will try to go beyond that and provide a 1.1 percent boost in doctor payments if lawmakers can agree on a way to offset that cost, he told the group.

Unless Congress acts in the next few weeks, a 10.6 percent payment cut will take effect in June, with deeper cuts to follow in 2009 and beyond.

Baucus also laid out several additional items he would like to include in a Medicare package this spring, but many of his proposals appear to be “wish list” ideas rather than the must-do items.