Home Health & Hospice Week

Physicians, therapists exempted from Medicare rules About a year from now you'll have to be accredited to supply durable medical equipment under Medicare, unless you're not a traditional DME supplier. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services "has issued an exemption for virtually every professional group except respiratory therapists, registered nurses, and pharmacists," the Na-tional Association of Independent Medical Equipment Suppliers notes in a message to members. The exempt list includes physicians, physical therapists, occupational therapists, and many more specialties. The American Podiatric Medical Associa-tion and the American Physical Therapy Associa-tion are praising CMS' exemption decision. "This is a huge victory," APTA's R. Scott Ward says in a release. "Physical therapists already provide care of the highest quality, so these unnecessary requirements would have been overly burdensome, costly and could have created obstacles for patients needing these services." NAIMES opposes the exemptions, the trade group says in a letter to CMS. "The mandatory accreditation requirement [is] a vital element in the fight against fraud, abuse, and billing errors in DME," it says. The move exempts more than 45,000 National Supplier Clearinghouse-listed suppliers from the requirements. "Exempting nearly half of the holders of supplier numbers goes against the intent of Con-gress," NAIMES argues. "These exemptions open another avenue for fraud that should be closed." And the decision discriminates against the industry. "This broad exemption seems to imply that DME suppliers are the only provider group with a fraud and abuse problem, however the facts do not support this premise," the trade group maintains. • Home care providers in the path of Hurricane Ike are dealing with many of the same problems Hurricane Gustav victims have faced -- power outages, short supplies and evacuations. To prepare for the storm, the Department of Health and Human Services activated the National Disaster Medical System to help with medical evacuations, special needs shelters and other related issues. A new Emergency Pharmacy Assistance Program provided a 30-day supply of replacement prescription medications and certain DME such as wheelchairs and canes, HHS said in a release. In advance of the storm, HHS declared a Texas public health emergency that relaxes regulations for Medicare providers in affected areas. For example, it suspends the requirement that patients receive home care services in their own homes, HHS noted in a separate release. CMS is also working with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to manage lost, stolen, or abandoned DME, HHS added. More information is online at http://www.hhs.gov/disasters/emergency/naturaldisasters/hurricanes/ike/actions.html. Home oxygen providers across the state prepared for Ike to hit, says the Council for Quality Respiratory Care. "The effects of a hurricane can wreak havoc on home oxygen patients, leaving thousands of oxygen users in need of emergency respiratory assistance to access [...]