David Miller made us better

I would like people to know that David Miller in his article (HME News, December 2004) talked about “those who went before us.” I was privileged to work with David in the late 70's and continued to work with him throughout the years. David represents the very characteristic that he talks about in his letter, humility, kindness, passion, and with David he added a sense of humor and a true zest for life. David shared his knowledge and energy with all he met and for me. As one of his suppliers he was a loyal and good customer. David had his own personal set of standards, and they were always a little higher (sometimes very much higher) than everyone's else, but he imposed his standards only on himself. David deserves much more credit than he has gotten for the status of the MED Group and his work to make our industry better respected in the eyes of all who work with us. I consider it both a privilege and honor to be able to say, I worked and got to know David Miller. - Otto Roberts works at the ROHO Group Unpaid ad? Shame on HME News! Mal Mixon's November “commentary” is misplaced. It should belong under un-paid advertising! - Doug DeVries CMS left the doors open In Mark Schmeler's commentary (HME News September 2004) on the industry's CMN battle, he quoted an unidentified bureaucrat from CMS who said “denying Medicare the right to examine additional documentation to justify medical necessity is like telling IRS auditors they can't look beyond the 1040".  The IRS does have the authority to demand any documentation to determine tax liability, but they must get it from the person that signed the tax return, not the person that delivered it to them. Same goes for the CMN. CMS can go back and demand all of the information they need to determine medical justification from the doctor who completed and signed the form, not the person that delivers the form.  He also states that the CMN is a faulty document. Well it is exactly what the DMERCs and CMS asked Congress for as part of the Paperwork Reduction Act.  They got what they wanted and they deserve all of the credit for making it what it is. His statement that our decision should not be celebrated is no surprise coming from someone outside of our industry who is not aware of the hell the DMERC carriers and CMS has been putting the suppliers (who are mostly small business owners) through for the past seven years.  In the meantime, they left the doors to the U.S. Treasury wide open to make it easy for a few unscrupulous dealers to loot the place.  Sorry Mark, but we're proud of our one small victory and we will fight this to the finish. - Tom Lambert is owner of Maximum Comfort