Home Care Industry Continues Push For Competitive Bidding Bills in House and Senate
The home care industry led by AAHomecare continues a strong the push for cosponsors for the Medicare Durable Medical Equipment Access Act of 2007, H.R. 1845, introduced by John Tanner (D-TN) and David Hobson (R-OH).
This bill would modify the competitive acquisition provisions of the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003 (MMA) to protect patient access to quality care and protect homecare providers. Specifically, it would protect patients by requiring that competitive bidding not begin until quality standards are in place; exempt smaller, rural areas (metropolitan statistical areas with populations under 500,000), and allow all qualified providers to participate at the selected award price.
The bill currently has 109 cosponsors but that number needs to be much higher in order to create enough momentum to get these important changes to competitive bidding enacted into law.
A similar but not identical bill, S. 1428, was introduced in the U.S. Senate by Senators Ken Conrad (D-N.D.), Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), and Pat Roberts (R-KS). That bill now has 12 cosponsors with the addition of Senator Richard Burr (R-N.C.) earlier this month.
Congressmen Tanner and Hobson will speak about their efforts to blunt CMS' regulatory actions Oct. 2 at 7:30 a.m. in room W110A/B at the Orange County Convention Center at Medtrade in Orlando.
This article originally appeared in the September 2007 issue of HME Business.