Florida Providers Battle Medicaid Consumables Bid

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida providers are scrambling to
quash an effort that would establish a competitive bidding program
for the state’s Medicaid consumables program.

A bill to be voted on this week would mandate a competitive
bidding program for all incontinence and medical consumables by
December. Providers say such a move would decrease beneficiaries’
access to quality health care and raise costs.

According to Sean Schwinghammer, acting director of the Florida
Alliance of Home Care Services, language was “snuck into
appropriations bills” in both of the state’s legislative chambers
that authorized the Agency for Health Care Administration
(Florida’s Medcaid agency) to create a competitive bidding program
for Medicaid waivers and all consumable medical supplies.

“Each appropriations bill was over 380 pages, and this was just
a six-line paragraph in each that was put in, so it’s hard to
find,” Schwinghammer said. He added that the provision was inserted
on the Thursday before Easter “when everybody was on the way out of
town.”

Representatives of the recently formed
association flew to Tallahassee to fight the measure last week.
“FAHCS representatives have made great strides engaging elected
officials and policymakers, but the Senate appropriations bill was
approved and the House bill will be approved shortly,” the
association said in a Friday update. “The effort is now
concentrated on having the item removed in conference
committee.”

The conference committee is scheduled to begin considering the
appropriations bill today.

“Medicaid waivers are a big deal in our state,” said
Schwinghammer, “so consolidating them to one or two companies is
really scary. The way it has happened is not what good government
is about, and we’re trying to get it fixed.”

According to the FACHS update, there could also be a bill in the
works to competitively bid for a single-source provider for all of
the state’s HME needs.

Stopping both bidding proposals is paramount, the update said:
“No matter the subject matter, competitive bidding in health care
is a bad idea. It destroys patient service, closes the doors of
small business and creates high health care cost due to increased
hospitalizations.”