Category: Reimbursement

Is Medicare’s System for Challenging Coverage Determinations Unintentionally Unfair?

cguo 1 Comment

On March 25, Susan Jaffe published a blog post in the New York Times about Medicare’s recent change to cover skilled therapy (e.g. physical therapy, nursing care) where it is “reasonable and necessary” maintain a patient’s condition and to prevent deterioration, even when it is not likely that the patient will improve. Jaffe notes that the revisions will likely have a substantial impact on thousands of Medicare beneficiaries even though the change has been largely unnoticed.

The revision highlights a potential problem with the system in place for challenging Medicare coverage. The revision itself is unremarkable, reflecting what national Medicare policies professed, but what local contractors sometimes ignored. What is remarkable is the time it took for Medicare to make the revision, from when the controversy appeared to when Medicare posted the change in its manuals. This delay is problematic because it reflects a dichotomy in how coverage decisions are challenged and changed under Medicare – due not to medical necessity but to political and financial circumstances beyond patient control.

Constituents can change Medicare coverage policies through two processes. One is through the litigation system. Judges can overturn Medicare coverage decisions after patients have exhausted Medicare’s internal adjudication process. Yet, litigation can take years and judges usually defer to Medicare’s judgment. National Coverage Determinations (NCDs) provide an alternative under which constituents can encourage Medicare to reconsider or overturn a prior coverage decision. NCDs supersede Local Coverage Determinations (LCDs) – coverage decisions that affect a region of the United States. When Medicare determines that the LCDs for a specific technology or service are “inconsistent or conflict with each other to the detriment of Medicare beneficiaries,” Medicare can decide to issue an NCD to provide uniform coverage.

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New regulatory pathways and incentives for sustainable antibiotics: Recent European & US Initiatives

Timo Minssen Leave a comment

By Timo Minssen

Please find attached a ppt presentation on “New regulatory pathways and incentives for sustainable antibiotics: Recent European & US Initiatives” given on March 7, 2014 at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.  The presentation was followed by a discussion moderated by US patent attorney Melissa Hunter-Ensor, Partner at Saul Ewing, Boston.

I started out by emphasizing increasing problems of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) on a global level, providing new statistics and facts. This was followed by a discussion of main reasons for these alarming developments, such as inappropriate use in agriculture and medicine, insufficient precautions, lack of education, climate change, travel behavior, insufficient collaboration and funding of R&D, scientific complexities, and the problem that incentives provided by the traditional innovation system model often fail in the case of antibiotics.

Next the presentation focused on a variety of solution models that could be discussed to fight AMR. These include both conservational and preventive approaches comprising use limitations, increased public awareness, and better hygiene, but also reactive push & pull strategies, such as increased investments, new collaborative models for R&D in antibiotics, prizes, “sui generis” IP-related incentives, regulatory responses and new pathways for approval.

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News from OMHA Appellants Forum: Statistical Sampling Coming, Backlog Growing

mlawrence Leave a comment

Yesterday the HHS Office of Medicare Hearings and Appeals (OMHA) held a forum for appellants affected by its decision, which I blogged about last month, to hold off on assigning incoming appeals to ALJs while they work to clear a large backlog.  I was able to go, and enjoyed every minute.  This issue has received its share of attention in the news (Washington Post here, National Review online here), as well as controversy (see here and here), but I have not yet seen an article discussing some of the policy developments that came out of yesterday’s forum.  So I am going to play journalist for a minute, rather than academic, and share yesterday’s developments.  There were a lot of them: Read More

Medicare Stops Hearing Provider Appeals in Hopes of Clearing Backlog

mlawrence Leave a comment

When Medicare refuses to cover a treatment (such as inpatient hospitalization) or device (like diabetes testing supplies), the statute gives the disappointed beneficiary the right to appeal.  Furthermore, there are mechanisms by which the provider–which may be a hospital, doctor, durable medical equipment manufacturer, etc.–that recommended the treatment (and often stands to profit if it is covered) can appeal on the beneficiary’s behalf (or on their own if the claim is assigned).

The statute sets deadlines for decisions on appeal, but in recent years a flood of new cases has led to a growing backlog and long delays.  (The backlog is caused in large part by the Recovery Audit Contractor program, through which Medicare has been revisiting and revising coverage determinations from the past several years.   That is a subject for another day.)

On Christmas Eve, the office in the Department of Health and Human Services responsible for hearing appeals (that is, the Office of Medicare Hearings and Appeals), adopted a controversial mitigation measure: They’ve stopped hearing new appeals, while they work to clear the backlog.  Which will take at least two years.  (See recent coverage here.)

Yes, the law says that Medicare must hear appeals, so yes, this temporary measure is technically inconsistent with the law (which is not to say it is illegal, more below on that).  But in my view it is actually a good idea, and consistent with what I think is the best ultimate solution to the “backlog” problem.  Here’s why:

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Capturing Value in Advanced Medical Imaging

michaelyoung Leave a comment

On December 12, a bipartisan bill entitled the Excellence in Diagnostic Imaging Utilization Act of 2013 (HR 3705) was introduced in the House of Representatives which would require clinicians to use electronic clinical decision support tools (CDS) before ordering advanced diagnostic imaging tests for Medicare patients.  Structured around appropriate use criteria  developed by professional medical societies, the tools would aim to increase the value of advanced imaging studies by informing and guiding practitioners’ decisions across a variety of clinical settings.

Such tools would provide active feedback on the appropriateness and evidence base of various imaging modalities, and would require physicians to furnish rationales for ordering tests that are inconsistent with appropriate use criteria.  The bill also envisions the creation of registries that document how diagnostic tests are used in order to facilitate research and to enable feedback to clinicians on metrics related to appropriate use criteria.  In a press release, the American College of Radiology lauded the proposed legislation, stating that it would “revolutionize the specialty of radiology.”

Mandating the use of electronic clinical decision support tools portends at least three key improvements in clinical workflows and healthcare quality more broadly.

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Two Pills: “That Will Be $307,000, please.”

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By Christopher Robertson

So reads the cover of the MIT Technology Review this month.  The article is available for free online.  The article begins with the story of Kalydeco, which is priced at $294,000 per year.

The company also pledged to provide it free to any patient in the United States who is uninsured or whose insurance won’t cover it. Doctors and patients enthusiastically welcomed the drug because it offers life-saving health benefits and there is no other treatment. Insurers and governments readily paid the cost.

Hold on.  If patients can get the medicine for free even when their insurers decline to pay the cost, why would insurers “readily pay the cost?”

Coupling Genetic Counseling to Test Coverage

michaelyoung Leave a comment

By Michael Young

As debates surrounding genetic patent rights begin to settle, new questions and disputes have started to emerge around insurance coverage for genetic testing.  For the first time, a U.S. health insurance provider (Cigna) has decided to require evaluation by an American Board of Medical Genetics or American Board of Genetic Counseling certified counselor before covering the costs of genetic testing, including genetic tests for susceptibility to breast and ovarian cancer (e.g., BRCA1 and BRCA2).  Cigna specifies in its new coverage policy statement, which goes into effect on September 15, 2013, that coverage for such testing will require recommendation by a certified genetic counselor based on pre-test individual evaluation, pedigree analysis, and intent to engage in post-test counseling.

By mandating genetic counseling prior to testing, this requirement aims to reduce unnecessary tests and to increase the efficiency and efficacy of health risk management and service delivery. Earlier this week, however, the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) took aim at Cigna’s policy, claiming that it can “negatively impact the care of cancer patients by serving as a barrier to the appropriate use of genetic testing services.”  At least four key considerations appear to underpin ASCO’s apprehensions about Cigna’s new policy.

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Sex, People with Disabilities, Prostitution, and Universal Health Care: Reflections on “The Sessions”

I. Glenn Cohen Leave a comment

[Cross-Posted at PrawfsBlawg]

One of my favorite initiatives at Harvard Law School, where I teach, is that faculty members get to offer an optional 10-12 student not-for-credit “First-Year Reading Groups” on a topic of interest to them that is related to law in some way but not too law-class like. I’ve taught a reading group on bioethics and law through film that pairs films with papers/topics in bioethics (e.g., A.I. with readings on personhood, Minority Report and neuroscience and law and predicting criminality, Dirty Pretty Things and organ sale and exploitation, The Constant Gardener with clinical trials in the developing world, Eternal Sunshine for the Spotless Mind and therapeutic forgetting and “cosmetic neurology” and many others…)

Next year I will add The Sessions, a film I found very enjoyable starring John Hawkes, Helen Hunt, and William H. Macy from last year that I also found very bioethically interesting. The film is based on a true story and follows Mark O’Brien, a poet who lives in an Iron Lung due to complications from Polio. After unsuccessfully proposing to his caretaker, and believing the end of his life may be nearing, he decides he wants to lose his virginity. He hires Cheryl Cohen-Greene, a professional sex surrogate, who will offer him a maximum of six sessions but makes clear to him this is therapy not romance. I will stop there to avoid ruining the film, but on to the bioethics…

There are fairly clear issues raised about commodification, exploitation, the difference between sex therapy and prostitution, that I have written about in various forms in various places. These are certainly interesting issues but familiar enough. What the film newly prompted me to think about, though, is actually universal health care. In particular, as I have written about indirectly in a couple of papers, what would some of the most prominent theories explaining why we need universal health care say about whether the state should pay for sex therapy (or perhaps even prostitution) for people with disabilities like Mark who find themselves otherwise unable to have sex?

For example, in his wonderful book Just Health, my colleague Norman Daniels, coming from a more Rawlsian tradition (i.e., a liberal tradition focused on promoting liberty and distributive justice through giving priority to the worst-off), grounds the state’s role in promoting health in the obligation, as a matter of political justice, to ensure access to the “normal opportunity range” to pursue the “array of life plans reasonable persons are likely to develop for themselves.” Although Daniels’ focus is on health care, it seems to me that sexual satisfaction is also part of that normal opportunity range and part of a life plan most of us would like to pursue.

Similarly, Martha Nussbaum in her great book Frontiers of Justice, writing from a more aretaic (i.e., Aristotelian, focusing on character and virtue) perspective, has argued that the state’s role is to enable human flourishing by raising people above the threshold level on a number of “capabilities.” Among these she mentions “bodily integrity,” as including “having opportunities for sexual satisfaction and for choice in matters of reproduction.” I have previously discussed how this kind of approach may justify funding reproductive technologies, but it seems to me as though it also fairly directly establishes an argument for funding Mark’s attempts to lose his virginity.

Now this is meant to be provocative, of course. And for some this is no doubt a reductio ad absurdum against universal health care. Fair enough. But for those who believe there is a moral case for funding universal health care, does the argument also lead to funding these kinds of sex therapies? Health is important, of course, but let’s be frank (and my parents can stop reading at this point) so is sexual satisfaction, and both seem to me essential parts of the normal opportunity range and/or human flourishing.

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Live Blogging from FDA in the 21st Century Conference, Panel 5: Major Issues in Drug Regulation

I. Glenn Cohen Leave a comment

 [Live-blogging off-the-cuff, all errors, typos, etc, are my fault]

Geoffrey Levitt, Pfizer, Drug Safety Communication: The Evolving Environment

A drug by itself is just an object. Because of that fact it creates turf, governance. You must have effective processes for communicating accurate info.

Pharmacovigilance is the accuracy part. Spontaneous adverse event reports are flooding to companies. 600,000 of such reports go to Pfizer a year, with 2000 a day on avg. Each has to be classified, reported, and followed-up. If you mess up you get a warning letter. But it has limits: passive, haphazard, poor signal to noise value. Main value is generating safety signals to follow up on. But studies of that kind for follow-up are very expensive and competing with other possible safety studies and new drug development for funding.

For this reason there has been interest in active real-time drug safety monitoring, like Sentinel.

Once you have accurate and up to date info, how do you communicate it to the audiences that need it. It is not static info, dynamic and constantly changing, and often not fully baked. Timing is everything. That leads to governance. Who owns it? Which stakeholders get to drive it. In Wyeth v. Levine, S. Ct says drug sponsor owns the label, and is responsible at all times for content of the label, including safety info. In reality not that simple. Today there is a number of players outside health authority and drug sponsor who have emerged as powerful forces. Academic researchers, drug payers, detailers, and many others.  This is not by accident. One reason is emergence of vocal critics who have critiqued the sponsors ability to directly communicate. Claim that this is a form of collusion  of which Levitt does not agree.

Vioxx sparked a few important developments. IOM produced one of the most important recommendations that led to FDAAA especially as to post-market surveillance and power over the safety label. Balance of authority shifted from that authority towards FDA. FDA also began to be more proactive about communicating, even before fully confirmed and without participation of sponsor. Also put into place obligations to post clinical trial results on public website, so clinicaltrials.gov is born. In retrospect, that was the opening shot in a full barrage of FDA on clinical trial transparency. In Europe this had led to a drastic new policy of affirmatively publishing clinical study reports full-scale not just trial results.

Critics of the current model want to tear down the gate, and reinterpret data themselves by own standards. That may lead to different results and different conclusions. Will the erosion of the primacy of the sponsor and FDA lead to more truth or more confusion?

W. Nicholson Price II, Petrie-Flom Center, The Role of Innovation Policy in Pharmaceutical Manufacturing

M & M manufacturing is more precise than drug manufacturing. Poor innovation in drugs. 200 to 300 billion dollars a year are spent on drug manufacturing. This is very expensive and inefficient, contrary to the typical story that drug manufacturing is cheap. Drugs are way behind computers and electronics. Uses same processes as decades ago. A 20% reduction in manufacturing costs would lead to a gain annually 50 billion for consumers if paid back directly, or even more if invested in R & D. Connected also to drug shortages.

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