Accreditation Evolution

30 years ago

HME providers gearing up to attend the first annual National Affiliation of Durable Medical Equipment Companies (NADMEC) convention got a “boost,” as it was described in HomeCare, when Congressmen Charles Rangel, then chairman of the House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee, and Robert D. O’Connor, acting director for the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare Office of Reimbursement Practices, signed on as guest speakers.

Rangel would go on to discuss cost containment at the May convention, and O’Connor shared his insights on a national heath insurance program and how it would affect home-based Medicare patients.

On the legislative front, accreditation and certification were hot-button topics. In his column, “Information, Please,” NADMEC Executive Director Edward Rosemab said the following of the industry’s need for accreditation and certification:

“The booming growth of home care needs makes it even more vital that certain standards be set … Although there is a certain amount of controversy over the subject, most dealers acknowledge the importance of being accredited. Certainly an accredited firm would have a decided customer advantage over a non-accredited one.”

20 years ago

Accreditation remained an industry concern in 1988. Originally bantered about ten years prior, members of the industry continued to debate accreditation’s merits. In a two-page spread examining the issue, HomeCare readers had this to say about accreditation:

“The rest of the health care industry has a negative opinion of DME dealers. We feel accreditation will be beneficial to improving our image.”
— Andy Stuart, president of Echo Medical

“It’s a matter of quality control and patients deserve the best.”
— A.L. Corbin, president of Home Oxygen Medical Equipment

“Personally, I don’t perceive it as giving anyone a competitive edge because all quality dealers will be accredited. It won’t distinguish between the dealers that are already high quality; rather, it will distinguish the quality from the non-quality dealerships.”
— Daniel Moskovitz, CEO of Accredited Surgical Company

Accreditation remains a headline issue today with CMS’ recent announcement that by Sept. 30, 2009, all DMEPOS providers must be accredited to continue participation in Medicare.

10 years ago

April of 1998 saw a close call with a surety bond. In what HME providers called “an 11th hour reprieve,” the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) delayed the implementation of a mandatory $50,000 surety bond for Medicare providers to evaluate whether such a bond would place undue hardship on small businesses. This argument also continues today: In February, CMS proposed a $65,000 surety bond for providers.