Department of Health and Human Services 2023 – Federal Register Recent Federal Regulation Documents

This final rule sets forth routine updates to the Medicare home health payment rates for calendar year (CY) 2024 in accordance with existing statutory and regulatory requirements. This rule discusses comments received regarding access to home health aide services; implements home health payment-related changes; rebases and revises the home health market basket and revises the labor-related share; codifies statutory requirements for disposable negative pressure wound therapy (dNPWT); and implements the new items and services payment for the home intravenous immune globulin (IVIG) benefit. In addition, itfinalizes changes to the Home Health Quality Reporting Program (HH QRP) requirements and the expanded Home Health Value-Based Purchasing (HHVBP) Model; implements the new Part B benefit for lymphedema compression treatment items, codifies the Medicare definition of brace, and makes other codification changes based on recent legislation; adds an informal dispute resolution (IDR) and special focus program (SFP) for hospice programs; codifies DMEPOS refill policy; and finalizes proposed revisions for Medicare provider and supplier enrollment requirements.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA or the Agency) has determined that COGENTIN (benztropine mesylate) Injection, 1 milligram (mg)/1 milliliter (mL), was not withdrawn from sale for reasons of safety or effectiveness. This determination means that FDA will not begin procedures to withdraw approval of abbreviated new drug applications (ANDAs) that refer to this drug product, and it will allow FDA to continue to approve ANDAs that refer to the product as long as they meet relevant legal and regulatory requirements.

The Office of Child Support Services (OCSS), Administration for Children and Families (ACF), is requesting the OMB to extend approval of the Information Comparison with Insurance Data, with minor changes, for an additional three years. The current OMB approval (OMB No.: (0970-0342) expires January 31, 2024.

This document corrects technical errors in the final rule that appeared in the August 28, 2023 Federal Register titled ``Medicare Program; Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment Systems for Acute Care Hospitals and the Long-Term Care Hospital Prospective Payment System and Policy Changes and Fiscal Year 2024 Rates; Quality Programs and Medicare Promoting Interoperability Program Requirements for Eligible Hospitals and Critical Access Hospitals; Rural Emergency Hospital and Physician-Owned Hospital Requirements; and Provider and Supplier Disclosure of Ownership; and Medicare Disproportionate Share Hospital (DSH) Payments: Counting Certain Days Associated with Section 1115 Demonstrations in the Medicaid Fraction'' (referred to hereafter as the ``FY 2024 IPPS/LTCH PPS final rule'').

This notice acknowledges the receipt of an application from the Utilization Review Accreditation Commission (URAC) for continued approval by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) of URAC's national accrediting organization program for suppliers providing home infusion therapy (HIT) services and that wish to participate in the Medicare or Medicaid programs. The statute requires that within 60 days of receipt of an organization's complete application, CMS will publish a notice that identifies the national accrediting body making the request, describes the nature of the request, and provides at least a 30-day public comment period.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA or Agency) is announcing the availability of a final guidance for industry entitled ``Real-Time Oncology Review (RTOR).'' The purpose of this guidance is to provide recommendations to applicants on the process for submission of selected new drug applications (NDAs) and biologics license applications (BLAs) with oncology indications for review under RTOR. This guidance finalizes the draft guidance of the same title issued on July 22, 2022.

The invention listed below is owned by an agency of the U.S. Government and is available for licensing 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.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is issuing a final order to revoke the approved method for detecting residues of carbadox, a carcinogenic new animal drug used in swine feed. An approved method is required by the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act), as implemented by regulation, to show that no residue of carcinogenic concern from a new animal drug persists in any edible tissue or in any food derived from treated animals. The approved method measures quinoxaline-2-carboxylic acid (QCA) as a marker residue to detect the presence of any residue of carcinogenic concern. QCA is a metabolite of carbadox that FDA has judged does not present a carcinogenic risk. FDA is revoking the approved method for carbadox based on its determination that the method is inadequate to monitor the residue of carcinogenic concern in compliance with FDA's operational definition of no residue because there is no established relationship between the concentration of QCA residues as measured by the approved method and the concentration of the residue of carcinogenic concern.