Dear HME Provider

This month, columnist Cara Bachenheimer shares the following open letter to providers from Invacare Chairman Mal Mixon.

I would like to take a moment to share my thoughts with you regarding the status of national competitive bidding, i.e. suicide bidding.

Last year, 167 economists who are auction experts agreed and stated to Congress, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the public that the Medicare DME bidding program in its current form is fatally flawed and must be stopped. These independent experts highlighted what we’ve known all along: that the Medicare DME bid program will result in unsustainable low prices and lack of access.

This lack of access will have an incredibly damaging impact on the patients you serve, many of whom are the weakest and most vulnerable in our society. There will be a negative impact on the quality of care that can be achieved in the home, and patients will most likely end up in hospitals or nursing homes.

When home care is the trifecta of health care — patient preferred, better clinical outcomes and one-fifth the cost of institutional care — a program that destroys it makes no sense and must be stopped.

In addition to affecting patient care, NCB is a job-killing program. Thousands of jobs in the home care industry will be lost while the government says it is trying to do just the opposite — support the fragile economic recovery.

We are at a critical time and can now influence the future of our industry. The bill that has been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives, The Fairness in Medicare Bidding Act of 2011 (H.R. 1041), is gaining traction in the House with about 90 co-sponsors (as of press time).

The bill would eliminate the ill-conceived bidding program — paid for fully, at no cost to the industry.

We need to escalate our efforts to get more members of Congress signed on as co-sponsors. If all of us devote just a small amount of time to this effort, we can move this bill through Congress. But to do so we need each and every one of you to ask your representatives to sign on to H.R. 1041.

If ever there was a time to get involved, it is now. NCB is scheduled to be rolled out to an additional 91 MSAs on July 1, 2013.

This is NOW. GET MAD! Do something about it. Contact your representatives. Dial the U.S. Capitol switchboard at 202/224-3121 and ask for your member’s office. Let him or her know how this fatally flawed program will impact the patients that you serve.

Follow up in writing. Be specific. Talk about the job loss that will be related to this program and the potential for thousands of small businesses to close throughout the United States. Talk about patients being denied access. And ask for the sale — ask your representative to sign on to H.R. 1041.

Your national and state/regional associations, Invacare, VGM, The MED Group and industry leaders have been working tirelessly to end this ill-conceived program. But we need all of you to be involved. Make a financial contribution to your state and national associations’ political action committees. Do something.

There are 10,000 providers like you. We need you. We can stop this thing. Congress responds to its constituents, but it cannot respond if they don’t hear from you — each and every one of you.

It truly is “United we stand, divided we fall.”

Sincerely,
A. Malachi Mixon, III
Chairman
Invacare Corporation

A P.S. from Cara: If you need talking points or other assistance in contacting your representatives, visit the websites of your national and state/regional trade associations or your buying group. You can also contact me at the phone number or email address above.

Read more Washington Wit & Wisdom columns. View more competitive bidding stories.

A specialist in health care legislation, regulations and government relations, Cara C. Bachenheimer is vice president, government relations, for Invacare Corp., Elyria, Ohio. Bachenheimer previously worked at the law firm of Epstein, Becker & Green in Washington, D.C., and at the American Association for Homecare and the Health Industry Distributors Association. You can reach her at 440/329-6226 or [email protected].