House Energy and Commerce to Hold Hearing on Drug Pricing Legislation
Senate
Senators Thune and Carper Reintroduce Bill on Chronic Disease Management
Administration
Biden Administration to Divert Raw Materials for COVID-19 Vaccine and Provide Other Supplies to India
CDC Issues New Guidance for Vaccinated Americans
FDA Panel Votes to Keep Tecentriq on the Market
FDA to Propose Menthol Ban in Next Year
HHS Will Distribute $1 Billion for Community Health Centers
HHS Removes Some Prescribing Barriers for Buprenorphine
Final Rules
CMS Extends Comprehensive Joint Replacement Model Demonstration for Three Years
Proposed Rules
CMS Issues Proposed Rule on Payment Rates and Policies for Inpatient and Long-Term Hospitals
Below is Alston & Bird’s
Health Care Week in Review, which provides a synopsis of the latest news in healthcare regulations, notices, and guidance; federal legislation and congressional committee action; reports, studies, and analyses; and other health policy news.
Week in Review Highlight of the Week:
This week, CMS released its FY 2022 Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment System and Long-Term Care Hospital Rates Proposed Rule. Read more about the rule and other news below.
I. Regulations, Notices & Guidance
On April 26, 2021, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued guidance entitled,
Nonclinical Testing of Individualized Antisense Oligonucleotide Drug Products for Severely Debilitating or Life-Threatening Diseases; Draft Guidance for Sponsor-Investigators. FDA is publishing this draft guidance to help sponsor-investigators with developing the nonclinical information that FDA recommends to support an investigational new drug application (IND) for certain individual
Mark Wade Named Physician Partners of America s Chief Executive Officer
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Mark Wade, CEO TAMPA, Fla. (PRWEB) May 03, 2021 Physician Partners of America (PPOA) has named healthcare executive Mark Wade as its Chief Executive Officer as of May 1st, 2021. He brings over 20 years’ of leadership experience most recently serving 10 years at UnitedHealth Group (UHG) in various roles at both Optum and Surgical Care Affiliates (SCA).
Wade is a values based executive dedicated to the mission of improving the health system to better serve and keep American communities healthy and safe. He has a proven track record of spearheading rapid, transformative growth while driving out system waste so that physicians can focus on care and corresponding patient outcomes are measurably best in class.
Inpatient pay rule would give hospitals $2.5 billion boost
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CMS on Tuesday proposed eliminating its plan for providers to disclose their contract terms with Medicare Advantage insurers, one of a slew of high ticket changes in its Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment System rule.
In the proposed rule, CMS said hospitals would no longer be expected to report the median payer-specific negotiated charge with MA insurers on its Medicare cost reports retroactive to Jan. 1, 2021. The change would eliminate more than 63,000 burden hours for providers.
Hospitals have long challenged the agency s attempts to impose price transparency requirements, maintaining they wouldn t help consumers or lower healthcare costs.
(Photo by Alex Wong\Getty Images)
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has updated the Medicare fee-for-service payment rates and policies for inpatient hospitals and long-term care hospitals for 2022.
Before taking into account Medicare disproportionate share hospital payments and Medicare uncompensated care payments, the proposed increase in operating payment rates, increases in capital payments, increases in payments for new medical technologies, increases in payments due to implementation of the imputed floor and other proposed changes will increase hospital payments in FY 2022 by $3.4 billion, or 2.8%.
But there is much in the proposed rule beyond payment updates.
The proposed rule would require hospitals to report vaccination rates among healthcare staff. CMS is proposing the adoption of the COVID-19 Vaccination Coverage among Healthcare Personnel Measure to require hospitals to report COVID-19 vaccinations of workers in their facilities.