Page 6 - HME Business, June 2019

News / Trends / Analysis
CMS Unveils Round 2021 Timeline
Registration starts June 10 and the bid window opens on July 16 for the next iteration of the competitive bidding program, which includes significant changes.
item pricing and CBIC noted that is has provided various resources on its site, such as the Request for Bids Instructions, bidding rules, a Lead Item Pricing Calculator, fact sheets, checklists, and Bid Preparation Worksheets.
Industry Ramps up
Round 2021 Education
In addition to CMS’s webinars and CBIC’s online resources, various industry entities have banded together to give HME resources to help them prepare for Round 2021, including a new educa- tional web site and a June 5 bidding summit.
To give providers deeper Round 2021 infor- mation, the American Association for Homecare (AAHomecare), the Council for Quality Respiratory Care (CQRC), and the VGM Group banded together to release dmecbpeducation.com, a website designed to help HME providers better prepare the new round.
The new site includes educational resources and tools such as bid calculators to help providers make the right decisions when enrolling and bidding in Round 2021. A key resource on the site is its new bid calculators, which help providers better formu- late what their reimbursement will look like and how it will impact their business when they bid under lead item pricing.
Taking their Round 2021 educational efforts further, the educational coalition behind the dmecb- peducation.com website is hosting the Bid Smart 2019 Summit in Nashville, Tenn. on June 5.
The one-day summit, hosted at the One Century Place Conference Center in Nashville, will provide a day-long workshop that will address topics such as lead item pricing; bid surety bond; and the use of single payment amounts to set rates in non-compet- itive bidding areas.
Manual CRT Bill Launched in Senate
Companion to H.R. 2293 would exclude manual CRT wheelchairs from competitive bidding and suspend bidding-derived pricing on accessories for those chairs for 18 months.
CMS
registration and bid window and the biggest part of that announcement
rehabilitative technology (CRT) wheelchairs from the competitive bidding program and will delay Medicare from applying competitive bidding- derived reimbursement rates to accessories for manual CRT wheelchair for 18 months.
The new Senate bill is a companion to H.R. 2293, the Protecting Access to Complex Rehab Manual Wheelchairs Act, which was launched in the House in April by Reps. John Larson (D-Conn.) and Lee Zeldin (R.-N.Y.).
Together, the companion bills re-introduce legis- lative language that originally debuted in 115th Congress, but lapsed when that Congress’s term ended. The bills stem from the CMS’s June 2017 decision to exempt power CRT wheelchairs from competitive bidding, but to continue including manual CRT chairs in competitive bidding
“This violates the intent of past congressional legislation and will create significant access prob- lems for Medicare beneficiaries and other individ- uals with disabilities,” noted Don Clayback, execu- tive director of the National Coalition for Assistive and Rehab Technology (NCART). “By applying the flawed reimbursement structure of the Competitive Bidding Program, these reductions will diminish the accessibility of these products, which maximize patient health outcomes and independence.”
Clayback said providers and CRT stakeholders can download an updated position paper at bit.ly/ CRTpositionpaper, which includes both the Senate and House bill information, and that NCART will update its advocacy web sites to help CRT advo- cates contact their members of Congress.
Similarly, a statement from the American Association for Homecare called for advocates to reach out to their lawmakers.
“We urge mobility suppliers, manufacturers, and other HME stakeholders to contact their Senators to ask that they co-sponsor this bill to ensure that the experienced, highly-skilled suppliers who provide CRT aren’t subjected to unsustainable, bidding- derived pricing for manual CRT wheelchairs and accessories,” the statement read.
The VGM Groups Government Relations team also provides an online tool at bit.ly/manualCRTcon- tact to helping stakeholders contact their lawmakers to support the legislation.
is that CMS has stretched the bid window opening from an unspecified date in June to July 16.
“CMS encourages bidders
to take advantage of this additional time to prepare
by utilizing the comprehen-
sive bidder education mate- rials,” read a statement from
the Competitive Bidding Implementation Contractor (CBIC; dmecompetitivebid.com).
The more detailed timeline dates include:
• June 10 — Registration window opens for the DMEPOS Bidding System, DBidS, and Connexion, the program’s secure portal.
• July 16 — Bid window opens.
• Aug. 16 — DBidS registration closes (Connexion registration always remains open).
• Aug. 19 — Covered document review date for bidders to upload financial documents in Connexion.
• Sept. 18 — Bid window closes.
• Fall — Preliminary bid evaluation notification.
• Summer 2020 — CMS announces single
payment amounts and begins contracting process.
• Fall 2020 — CMS announces contract
suppliers.
• Jan. 1 2021 — Implementation of Round 2021
contracts and prices.
All the dates, except for implementation date,
are targets, according to CBIC. Further detail is at bit.ly/round2021timeline.
Round 2021 involves new features such as lead
has released the Round 2021 time- line with dates for the
S
ens. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) have introduced S. 1223, a bill that would permanently exclude manual complex
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