Providers and suppliers will be under greater scrutiny when submitting claims for large numbers of test strips and lancets, thanks to an Office of Inspector General (OIG) June 2012 report. The OIG report estimates contractors overpaid as much as $271 million for these types of claims in 2007. In response to the report, contractors say they have made appropriate changes, or plans to do so.
Archive for July, 2012
Tighter Controls on Diabetic Supply Claims
Drug Shortage Legislation Passes the House
Last year, The American Society of Anesthesiologists strongly urged a federal investigation into the drug shortage problem in the U.S. healthcare system. That led to The House Energy and Commerce Health Subcommittee holding a hearing in the fall they called “Examining the Increase in Drug Shortages.” Since then, there has been considerable legislative headway.
Medicare and Insurer Revenue Growth Jumps
According to the Standard & Poor’s Healthcare Economic Indices, healthcare professionals and hospitals saw accelerated per capita growth in revenue from Medicare and commercial insurers in the past 12 months ending in April. S&P’s healthcare composite index for that 12-month period jumped by 6.14 percent as compared to a 5.65 percent increase for the 12 months ending in March.
Breaking revenue changes down into public and private sources, Medicare fee-for-service revenue for hospitals and healthcare professionals were up by 2.6 percent in the 12 months ending last April. Commercial revenue saw a more dramatic change with an 8.46 percent increase.
“There is a clear upward trend across all annual growth rates, which began around October 2011, and we have now reached close to the top of the range of price changes established over the last few years,” said David Blitzer, index committee chairman for Standard & Poor’s Indices, in a news release. “The April increase in the composite’s annual growth rate was largely driven by a substantial jump in commercial plans.”
According to Standard & Poor’s, one of the primary purposes of their Healthcare Economic Indices is to help medical professionals and the public as a whole better understand the costs associated with healthcare. Over the last 10 years, trends of annual cost increases have varied from mid-single digits to mid-teens.