June 26, 2008 Tonight, the U.S. Senate fell one vote short of the 60 votes needed to clear a procedural hurdle to pass the Medicare bill that received a resounding 355 votes in the House of Representatives earlier in the week. Following the vote, the Senate joined the House in adjourning for a 10-day Independence Day recess. The start of the recess means that there is no chance of Congress taking any further action to avoid the disruption of vital services and administrative headaches that will occur starting Tuesday, July 1. NASL and hundreds of other patient and provider organizations have warned lawmakers repeatedly about these problems.
The Senate vote was 59-40 (Senator Ted Kennedy was absent due to his serious illness) in favor of bringing the Medicare bill up for floor consideration, but under Senate rules, 60 Yes votes were required to overturn objections raised by a number of Republican senators. Fifty Democrats and nine Republicans voted Yes, while 40 Republicans voted No. Congress will reconvene July 7.
June 19, 2008 Senate Republicans said will offer a bill to simply extend existing Medicare programs for 18 months. The bill, still in draft form, was to be introduced by Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the ranking Republican on the Finance Committee. It would make few of the changes to Medicare that Democrats are seeking in a bill by Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT). Instead, Grassley’s draft bill would simply extend for 18 months a number of existing Medicare programs, including a program to provide exceptions for limits on therapy programs.
June 18, 2008 CMS announced it will soon launch a ground-breaking ranking system of America’s nursing homes, giving each a “star” rating. CMS is requesting comments on the system designed to provide patients and their families an easy to understand assessment of nursing home quality, making meaningful distinctions between high performing and low performing homes. The ratings will be posted on the agency’s Nursing Home Compare Web site by the end of this year. A sample screen shot of the proposed star ratings is available at www.cms.hhs.gov/PressContacts/10_PR_fivestar.asp. Medicare Compare can be found at www.medicare.gov.
June 17, 2008 Senators Max Baucus (D-MT) and Charles Grassley (R-IA) co-sponsored legislation that would delay the first two rounds of a Medicare competitive bidding program for durable medical equipment. Both had proposed a delay in their respective Medicare bills. The measure proposed would terminate contracts awarded under the program’s first round — now scheduled to begin July 1 — and re-bid those areas so that new contracts would take effect in 18 to 24 months, the senators said in a news release. Round two of the program would not take effect before January 2011. “I am supportive of competitive bidding as a means of reducing cost, but that cannot be accomplished at the expense of low quality and inconsistent care,” Baucus said in a statement. Grassley said the measure would prevent many small home medical equipment suppliers from going out of business, which has been a key complaint of DME industry.
June 11, 2008 "About 5,000 hospitals offer outpatient physical therapy, compared to more than 17,000 nursing homes," The Hill Newspaper today quoted NASL Executive Vice President Peter Clendenin in an article discussing implementation of the therapy caps on July 1 if Congress fails to act in time. The caps apply to services received in therapists’ offices, physicians’ offices, nursing homes and other settings, but do not apply to therapy received on an outpatient basis at hospitals.
June 11, 2008 This afternoon, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus announced his intention to add a delay of the durable medical equipment, prosthetics, orthotics, and supplies (DMEPOS) competitive acquisition program (CAP) to S. 3101, the Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act of 2008 (MIPPA). Senator Baucus and other Members of Congress have received reports about potential inaccuracies in the implementation of the CAP program.
June 11, 2008 Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) today introduced the Senate Republican Medicare relief legislation. The GOP proposal includes many of the key elements that were included in the proposal introduced Monday by Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT), however, it is expected to have a narrower scope than the Baucus bill and pursue offsets in a different manner. A summary of the legislation is also available.
June 10, 2008 Today’s edition of the Washington Post reports on the swirl of legislative activity regarding the DMEPOS competitive bidding program. Suppliers Fight Plan to Cut Medicare's Equipment Costs
