Archive: May 2002
If you had to choose, how would you prefer that Medicare make its next DMEPOS reimbursement adjustment?
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
Cut fee Schedule - 59%
Other - 20%
IR - 17%
Competitive Bidding - 4%
NewsPoll based on answers provided by 46 respondents.
"There needs to be a complete fee schedule overhaul. True Medicare reform will be most progressive with a standardized system. We must be proactive not reactive. We must treat the disease not the symptoms."
- Danny Klaus, Texas Medical Distributors
"If the government insists on more destruction why don't they just take over the homecare industry...
Associations, providers lobby DOT to revamp travel O2 regs
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
WASHINGTON - There's a move afoot to change federal regulations governing travel oxygen, with the goal of making it easier for patients to fly and HMEs to do their job.
Under current Department of Transportation regulations, respiratory patients can't take their own systems on planes. What's worse, some airlines don't provide O2, and those that do, too often do so inadequately, without, for example, any understanding of liter flows. Additionally, since airlines don't provide oxygen outside the plane,...
Paperless offices remain rare
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
ANN ARBOR, Mich. - In theory, the paperless office is where everyone wants to be; In reality, HME providers have been reluctant to embrace the concept.
Although Computers Applications Unlimted unveiled a document imaging system one year ago, the company is still trolling a reluctant market for customers. CareCentric found one customer who is happy with the system in Oakwood Village, Ohio-based Medical Service Companies, but then dropped its initiative due to low demand.
In March, Fastrack Healthcare...
MED Group revamps mobility repair program
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
LUBBOCK, Texas - The MED Group tweaked its Certified Repair Center program to make it more valuable to members and hired a long-time Everest & Jenning employee with years of technical experience to run it. Former E&J and Mulholland Positioning Systems employee, Dick Fuller, brings 18 years of sales, marketing and technical experience to MED. The CRC program offers technical training on mobility products taught by participating manufacturers. To make attendance easier for members and manufacturers,...
"I think the conclusion you can draw is that Innomed wrote a press release that was sufficiently effective in scaring
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
-Â Analyst Bruce Jacobs of Deutsche Banc Alex Brown in Boston on the stock prices of the nation's two CPAP heavyweights, respironics and resmed, declining sharply following reports that innomed technologies had logged $20 million in sales commitments for its new nasal interface.
Go to story
People
William Post has joined Respironics as vice president of sales and marketing. Post previously worked as president and CEO of Opticon Medical, a development-stage medical device company in the...
California HME tells his story, newspaper loves it
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
CONCORD, Calif. - Cliff Woolard hit a marketing home run in April.
The general manager pitched to the local newspaper, the Contra Costa Times, that it's no easy trick to survive 20 years in the HME business when faced with near billion-dollar competitors like Apria and Lincare. The reporter who writes "Entrepreneurs Edge," a weekly feature on local small businesses, agreed.
Since the feature ran April 20, Home Med-Equip has been inundated with calls, just as Woolard had hoped.
"People call, saying,...
Providers protest comp. bidding
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
MIAMI - Several HME providers who have been actively protesting the state's competitive bidding project took things up a notch last month when they organized a demonstration outside a representative's office here.
On May 17, about 30 people congregated outside the office of Rep. Carlos Lacasa (R-Miami), chair of the Fiscal Responsibility Council. They reportedly attracted the attention of motorists, who doled out money for a lawsuit the Florida Association of Medical Equipment Services (FAMES) has...
URAC approves new DSM standards
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
WASHINGTON - The American Accrediation HealthCare Commission (URAC) has approved its new disease management standards.
The standards, developed by an advisory committee made up of representatives of healthcare organizations, healthcare providers, purchasers, and other experts, are designed to promote best practices in care management strategy for individuals with chronic diseases. URAC is a non-profit organization that accredits the utilization management programs of managed care companies
URAC's...
'They kicked my teeth out'
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
SACRAMENTO, Calif. - Almost a year to the day that Scott Vogelsang appeared on the cover on an industry publication next to the headline "When is Fraud Okay?" the U.S. government charged the DME provider with healthcare fraud.
"Here I am telling them what kind of problems they have internally (in the Dealer Provider article), and they turn around and kick my teeth out," Vogelsang told HME News last month. "I should have stayed in engineering."
In April, the U.S. Department of Justice charged Vogelsang,...
DMERC downcodes CRI's Lasette Plus
May 31, 2002HME News Staff
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - The joy Cell Robotics International broadcast in January when the company found out that the allowable on its new blood sampling device came in at $870 has turned into a frustrating educational lap around DMERC policy.
Soon after a provider filed a claim for the E0260 in early March, CRI learned a hard lesson about downcoding. While the provider, and CRI, expected the claim to yield $870, the DMERC declined to cover the item and downcoded the claim to a fraction of the Lasette...