American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science - Minnesota

A MSA Site Has Been Chosen! Taken from CLMA Action Alert e-mail

Now that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has announced that the San Diego-Carlsbad- San Marcos MSA is the first site for the competitive bidding demonstration project for clinical laboratory services, many laboratories located in the remaining 21 potential MSAs are breathing a sigh of relief.

However, a second site will be selected and if both are successful, competitive bidding will go nationwide! The only way to stop competitive bidding now is to lobby Congress to enact legislation to repeal the demonstration project before the demonstration goes live!

Currently two repeal bills have been introduced; the "Protecting Access to Clinical Laboratory Services Act of 2007(S 2099)" and the "Community Clinical Laboratory Fairness in Competition Act (HR 3453),"

On October 2, 2007, CLMA launched a grassroots campaign to gain support for S 2099 and HR 3453, and CLMA members have more than answered the call to action.To date 854 emails from 427 members have gone to the Senate, and 511 emails have gone to the House asking for co-sponsors for the repeal bills. We have reached 322 Senators and Congressmen combined so far! Grassroots efforts are having an impact.

In addition to Rep. Nydia Velazquez (NY), HR 3453 now has 20 co-sponsors. In addition to Senator Ken Salazar (CO), S 2099 now has 5 co-sponsors.

For a list of co-sponsors, please visit http://thomas.loc.gov/ and search using HR 3453 and S 2099.

If you have not yet contacted your Member of Congress to support the repeal of competitive bidding, please do so today! ACT NOW! Contact your Senators and Representative and urge them to co-sponsor legislation to repeal the competitive bidding demonstration project and stop CMS from implementing it.

The links below will connect you to action alerts for both S 2099 and HR 3453. A template letter has been provided for each bill. You can customize the letter with your own story. Also, if your Member of Congress is already a co-sponsor of S 2099 or HR 3453, please customize the letter to thank them for their support. Your letter will automatically be emailed to your Members of Congress.

Note: The links below represent separate letters to your two Senators and to your Representative. Please click on each link separately in order to contact both the Senate and the House.

House Bill (HR 3453): http://capwiz.com/clma/issues/alert/?alertid=10372476
Senate Bill (S 2099): http://capwiz.com/clma/issues/alert/?alertid=10372386

-Taken from a CLMA Action Alert e-mail
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CLINICAL LABORATORY COALITION STANDS UNITED
IN SUPPORT OF LAWSUIT AGAINST FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

Bethesda, MD – The American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science (ASCLS) has joined with the other members of the Clinical Laboratory Coalition (CLC) to announce its support for a lawsuit filed January 29, 2008 by San Diego area clinical laboratories and health systems in an attempt to stop the federal government from moving forward in its plan to limit San Diego laboratory services.  Filed by Internist Laboratory of Oceanside, Sharp Healthcare of San Diego, and Scripps Healthcare of San Diego against the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt, the lawsuit also seeks to require public notice and comment on this project, as mandated by federal law. 

The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), as part of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003, chose San Diego as the first of two demonstration project locations to use so-called “competitive bidding” for clinical laboratory services.  The agency will accept bids on laboratory services and select only a very limited number of labs to perform tests that will be reimbursed under Medicare Part B services.  Those labs that don’t win the bid can not bill for reimbursement of Medicare lab testing services.  Rather than creating competition, it will result in fewer labs, less competition and the government in essence picking winners and losers.  Bids are due to CMS by February 15, 2008.

“The legal action being undertaken by the plaintiffs provides evidence for the broad negative impact that the CMS Competitive Bidding demonstration project will have for laboratories, hospitals and beneficiaries,” said Rick Panning, President of ASCLS.  “This action is a warning flag for the government, highlighting the fact that the implementation, as planned, will negatively impact laboratory service quality and also reduce access to quality services for Medicare patients.”

“ASCLS and its members believe that competitive bidding will irrevocably harm access to care for millions of Medicare beneficiaries. We have been very concerned about the damage done to the continuity of health care for one of our nation’s most vulnerable patient populations when medical services such as those provided by clinical laboratory scientists, technicians and pathologists are bid as if they were a commodity.  Given the gravity of the financial status of Medicare, we find it alarming that CMS is spending so much time and financial resources for services that account for less than 1.7%* of the dollars spent by the program,” said Elissa Passiment, Executive Vice President of ASCLS. 

Internist, Sharp HealthCare and Scripps Healthcare are fighting to be able to continue to serve San Diego residents.   These laboratories will either be forced to shut down all together or close their laboratory outreach services if they aren’t selected as winning bidders. 

The lawsuit was filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California.

The Clinical Laboratory Coalition is comprised of the following organizations:  Advanced Medical Technology Association (AdvaMed), American Association of Bioanalysts (AAB), American Association for Clinical Chemistry (AACC), American Clinical Laboratory Association (ACLA), American Medical Technologists (AMT), American Society for Clinical Laboratory Science (ASCLS), American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP), American Society for Microbiology (ASM), Clinical Laboratory Management Association (CLMA), College of American Pathologists (CAP), and National Independent Laboratory Association (NILA).

*(Medicare overall spending was $401.3 billion in 2006 of which $6.7 billion was for clinical laboratory services.)

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Update

April 2008

Senator Coleman has agreed to co-sponsor S 2099, legislation to repeal competitive bidding.

A special thanks to those of you who took the time to contact the Senator’s office. Now is a great time to contact the Senator’s office again to thank him for his support on this issue. Below is contact information for your convenience:

Washington Office:
320 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510-2303
Phone: (202) 224-5641
Fax: (202) 224-1152

Health LA: Andrew McKechnie
Web contact form: http://coleman.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Contact.ContactForm

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