Archive: June 2004
Medicare HMOs cost 8.4% more
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
CHICAGO - If HME providers are singing the blues because of competitive bidding and other reimbursement cuts mandated by the Medicare Modernization Act, managed care companies must be whistling Dixie.
An analysis of government data by the Commonwealth Fund found payments to private plans in 2004 will average 8.4% higher than the cost of Medicare fee-for-service. That comes out to $552 more per recipient.
MMA supporters backed the higher payments as a way to entice private payers back into the Medicare...
Setting sail into a stormy sea of change
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
The Medicare Prescription Drug Act has launched the HME provider into uncertain seas. Not since, the Balanced Budget Amendment of 1997 and the Six Point Plan of 1989 have HMEs faced such momentous change to their business. If the legislated changes are implemented, the cheese will not be exhausted, but it will be moved. The challenge? A new route to respectable profitability. Before reporting the following suite of stories, we asked HME providers for new opportunities and new ways to cut costs. Here...
Plop, plop - fiz, fiz
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
YARMOUTH, Maine - Some HME providers believe the answer to rising gas prices could lie in smaller, more fuel-efficient delivery vans, but Rick Perrotta isn't one of them.
Rising gasoline prices have put the squeeze on providers, spurring them to come up with new strategies to help contain fuel costs.
In fact, the president of New Medical Supply addressed his company's fuel costs several years ago. That's when the Charlotte, N.C., company traded in its conventional gas vans for diesel-powered vehicles....
Stratifying service levels raises an ethical question
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
Although Medicare does not require its Part B contractors to provide home delivery for beneficiaries, it has long been customary for them to do so at no charge.
But under the margin-erasing provisions put forth in the Medicare Prescription Drug Act that practice may come to a grinding halt. In fact, homecare consultant Kevin O'Donnell recommends providers get out of the transportation business altogether. Instead of shouldering the costs of fleet management, providers could instead arrange for third-party...
Legal
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
CERT reviews and HIPAA rules
With Jim Walsh
J. Walsh
Q. Our HME has received a letter from a company named AdvanceMed, which indicated that some of our claims were selected as part of a random CMS review. The letter asks for submission of medical records and detailed supporting documentation. Isn't this a HIPAA issue, that is, won't we need patient authorizations to release this information?
A. Let me begin with “who is AdvanceMed.” CMS developed a program titled CERT, or Comprehensive...
Home oxygen pioneer becomes a beneficiary
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
Pulmonologist Thomas Petty, MD, is known in medical circles as the “father of home oxygen” because he has advocated and prescribed its use for nearly 40 years. Now, in an ironic twist of fate, he is on the other side of the cannula as a home oxygen patient himself.
Tom Petty
Petty, 71, is on portable liquid oxygen as he recuperates from a stubborn infection he contracted during heart valve surgery last year. Though he is optimistic about eventually getting off oxygen, “it won't...
Heart Alert soars with telemedicine program
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
ATLANTA, Ga. and OAK PARK Mich. - A combination of technology and homecare has created a partnership dedicated to improving outcomes for patients with chronic illness.
A Nurse instructs a patient how to use a remote monitoring blood pressure cuff as part of the VNA of Southeast Michigan's telehomecare program.
Atlanta-based disease management provider Heart Alert was approached in 2002 by the Visiting Nurse Association of Southeast Michigan to develop a TeleHomecare program for heart failure patients...
VGM’s Heartland ploughs up praise
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
WATERLOO, Iowa - The hundreds of providers who attended VGM's Heartland Conference in June devoured a 200+ pound pig during the opening day hog roast and then moved on to the event's main course: a cornucopia of educational seminars and network opportunities.
Heartland Conference attendees wonder whether farming is an easier row to hoe than HME these days.
In all, 725 people attended the June 1-4 event. In addition to the 450 providers, attendees included 225 people representing 78 vendors and 50...
Johnson takes over Pride’s gov’t affairs
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
EXETER, Pa. - Seth Johnson, who was AAHomecare's vice president of government affairs, in June replaced Martin Szmal as director of government affairs at Pride Mobility Products.
“We really wanted to give not only Pride but the industry more visibility with CMS and with members of Congress to make sure our issues and concerns are addressed with key individuals in a timely manner,” said Kevin Quaglia, Pride's general manager of industry relations. “Having that representation in...
$150 million later, iBots roll
June 30, 2004HME News Staff
WARREN, N.J. - Since the first iBot hit the streets of Riverside, Calif., in January, Johnson & Johnson has rolled out its stair-climbing, $29,000 power wheelchair in Houston, Chicago, St. Louis, New Jersey and Denver. Next up: Washington, D.C. and Miami.
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J&J declined to reveal how many iBots have been sold since the roll-out or to comment on reimbursement by third-party payers. A spokesman wrote in an e-mail that “sales are right in line with projections and everyone is pleased with...