The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has announced a 60-day delay of the effective date of the Competitive Bidding Interim Final Rule, to April 18, 2009.
According to the American Association for Homecare, the announcement came one day after comments on the rule were due to the agency and just weeks after a memorandum from White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel recommending that all federal agency heads consider “extending for 60 days the effective date of regulations that have been published in the Federal Register but not yet taken effect…for the purpose of reviewing questions of law and policy raised by those regulations.”
AAH comments on the rule noted that “CMS did not fully consider the circumstances driving Congress’ decision to delay Round One under §154(b), even though CMS was fully engaged at every stage of the negotiations and understood what Congress wanted to accomplish. By rushing to publish the IFR, CMS closed any possibility of addressing, on a public record, or objections to moving with a new Round One.”
A number of home medical equipment (HME) stakeholders expressed concern about the rule at the House Small Business subcommittee hearing, held Feb. 10 by Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.).
“This competitive bidding program is anti-competitive and fundamentally flawed,” said Georgetta Blackburn, vice president of Pittsburgh home medical equipment company Blackburn’s. “It will eliminate 90 percent of the homecare providers – typically small, family-owned businesses – in any marketplace where it is implemented.”
AAH President Tyler Wilson said he hoped that CMS would “circle back” and conclude they should work with homecare providers through the PAOC and other means to make sure the reimplementation is free of flaws.
“Or better yet, CMS should work with the HME community to convince Congress that the bidding program should be scrapped,” Wilson said.
According to the Feb. 10 Federal Register notice about the IFR, the competitive bidding rule implements certain MIPPA provisions that delay implementation of Round 1 of the competitive bidding program, and requires CMS to conduct a second Round 1 competition in 2009.
“It constitutes a government-mandated consolidation of the marketplace that will lead to significant job losses precisely at a time when the government is making efforts to stimulate job creation,” said Blackburn.