Industry Continues Fight to Suspend Competitive Bidding
In the weeks following AAHomecare’s Legislative Conference, the industry was still putting pressure on Capitol Hill.Leveraging the industry’s recent surge of front-line organizing, NAIMEs launched an online petition for the suspension and repeal of competitive bidding. The petition can be found at
http://thepetitionsite.com/petition/141840894
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“Our goal is 30,000 signatures,” said NAIMES president and CEO Wayne Stanfield in a prepared statement. “The very existence of the DME industry may depend on our grassroots efforts.”
Stanfield urged providers to encourage their employees, referral partners, patients, caregivers and even friends to visit the site and digitally sign the petition.
Meanwhile, back on the Hill, two “dear colleague” letters urging congress members to sign onto a letter to CMS expressing concerns about the potential negative impact of competitive bidding on providers and their patients continue to make their way around the House and the Senate.
The Senate and House letters, which were respectively authored by Sens George Voinovich (R-Ohio) and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Congressman Jason Altmire (D-Pa.), can be seeon the AAHomecare site.
AAHomecare also called on providers to download a sample congressional letter asking Health and Human ServicesSecretary Michael Leavitt to suspend round one of competitive bidding, and then ask their senators and representatives to sign and send the letter to Leavitt.
This article originally appeared in the April 2008 issue of HME Business.