Department of Health and Human Services July 12, 2007 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

The inventions listed below are owned by an agency of the U.S. Government and are available for licensing in the U.S. in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 207 to achieve expeditious commercialization of results of federally funded research and development. Foreign patent applications are filed on selected inventions to extend market coverage for companies and may also be available for licensing.

This proposed rule would address certain provisions of the Tax Relief and Health Care Act of 2006, as well as make other proposed changes to Medicare Part B payment policy. We are proposing these changes to ensure that our payment systems are updated to reflect changes in medical practice and the relative value of services. This proposed rule also discusses refinements to resource-based practice expense (PE) relative value units (RVUs); geographic practice cost indices (GPCI) changes; malpractice RVUs; requests for additions to the list of telehealth services; several coding issues including additional codes from the 5-Year Review; payment for covered outpatient drugs and biologicals; the competitive acquisition program (CAP); clinical lab fee schedule issues; payment for renal dialysis services; performance standards for independent diagnostic testing facilities; expiration of the physician scarcity area (PSA) bonus payment authorized by section 413 of the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement and Modernization Act of 2003 (MMA); conforming and clarifying changes for comprehensive outpatient rehabilitation facilities (CORFs); a process for updating the drug compendia at section 1861(t)(2)(B) of the Social Security Act (the Act); physician self-referral issues; beneficiary signature for ambulance transport services; durable medical equipment (DME) update; the chiropractic services demonstration; a Medicare economic index (MEI) data change; technical corrections; issues related to therapy services; revisions to the ambulance fee schedule; the ambulance inflation factor for CY 2008; and the proposal to eliminate the exemption for computer-generated facsimile transmissions from the National Council for Prescription Drug Programs (NCPDP) SCRIPT standard for transmitting prescription and certain prescription-related information for Part D eligible individuals.