Vaccination bill clears Asembly Health Committee after nearly five hours of discussion, testimony Senate Bill 277, which would bar parents from skipping school vaccination requirements due to personal philosophies, passed its first test in the state Assembly on Tuesday. Policymakers in the Assembly Health Committee approved the bill on a 12-6 vote. SB 277 would allow only medical exemptions for children entering public school by removing the option to file a personal belief exemption (PBE). The bill would not pertain to families who homeschool or utilize independent study. As in previous hearings, both proponents and opponents of SB 277 filled up the room to ... June 26, 2015 General Advocacy, Immunization, Public Health, State Legislation, Vaccination, I Heart Immunity 0 0 Comment Read More »
What is commercial risk adjustment? Over the past few months, CMA has received several calls from practices who had received requests for medical records from various payors stating the records are needed for “risk adjustment.” The records requests are a result of the commercial risk adjustment program created by Section 1343 of the Affordable Care Act. The primary goal of the risk adjustment program is to spread the financial risk borne by payors more evenly in order to stabilize premiums and provide issuers the ability to offer a variety of plans to meet the ... June 26, 2015 General, Managed Care Payors, Medical Records 0 0 Comment Read More »
CMS announces transition of single sign-on IACS system The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) established the Individuals Authorized Access to the CMS Computer Services (IACS) as a means to provide a single user ID for business partners to access multiple CMS applications. For physician offices, this consists primarily of the Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS)/eRx Physician Quality Reporting System and E-Prescribing Incentive Programs. CMS has announced that, on July 13, 2015, authorized users of the IACS system will be transitioned to the existing Enterprise Identity Management (EIDM) system. The EIDM system will allow a single ... June 26, 2015 General CMS, PQRS, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services 0 0 Comment Read More »
Anthem Special Investigations Unit may be recouping beyond statutory timeframe In 2011, the California Medical Association (CMA) raised concerns with Anthem’s attempts to recoup money from physicians beyond the statutory timeframe. Through its Special Investigations Unit (SIU), Anthem was pursuing physicians for refunds of payments made outside of the 365-day period allowed by California law. That law permits recoupment of claims older than a year only if the payment was made based on fraud or misrepresentation. CMA determined that Anthem was employing a definition of “misrepresentation” that was much broader than what is allowed under law. CMA thus filed ... June 26, 2015 General, Managed Care Department of Managed Health Care, Recoupment, Anthem Blue Cross 0 0 Comment Read More »
CMA President's Message: A Critical Year for Health Care We haven’t quite hit the halfway mark, but 2015 is already shaping up to be an important year for health care. In just these past few months, legislators have repealed the Medicare sustainable growth rate (SGR), saving physicians from an imminent 21 percent payment cut, and have considered an abundance of new bills aimed at solving several major health issues across the state. The topic of health has been filling front-page headlines at every leading newspaper in California recently, reaffirming my belief that this is truly an exciting time to be ... June 15, 2015 General, Medi-Cal, Medicare President's Message, Physician Leadership 0 0 Comment Read More »
CMA Capitol Insight: June 10, 2015 CMA Capitol Insight is a biweekly column by veteran journalist Anthony York, reporting on the inner workings of the state Legislature. Long legislative days, dry summer nights It was a frantic week in Sacramento, with hundreds of bills passed by the Senate and Assembly as the Capitol wrestled with deadline week. Last week, it was the house of origin deadline. All bills that started in the Assembly or Senate had to clear that house by Friday. The results were long legislative days, swarms of lobbyists huddled outside the Assembly and Senate chambers, ... June 15, 2015 General CMA Capitol Insight, Anthony York 0 0 Comment Read More »
Strong majority of Californians support requiring vaccinations for school children Some of the key findings in a statewide survey published on June 3 showed that a majority of those surveyed agreed with Senate Bill 277 (Pan), a bill sponsored by the California Medical Association that would eliminate personal belief exemptions and require parents to vaccinate their children before enrolling them in school. According to a survey released yesterday by the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC), two-thirds of Californians (67 percent) and public school parents (65 percent) say children should not be allowed to attend unless they are vaccinated. Majorities ... June 15, 2015 General Immunization, Public Health, State Legislation, Vaccination, Advocacy, I Heart Immunity 0 0 Comment Read More »
Senate passes bills to regulate e-cigarettes, raise smoking age Two bills aimed at making it harder for California’s youth to use tobacco products passed in the state Senate on Tuesday. Senate Bill 151 (Hernandez) would raise the minimum age for buying cigarettes from 18 to 21. SB 140 (Leno) would regulate e-cigarettes similar to combustible cigarettes, including banning their use in the usual “smoke-free” locations, such as schools, restaurants and hospitals. SB 151 was the first of the two bills heard on the Senate floor. It passed on a 26-8 vote. “We will not sit on the sidelines while big tobacco ... June 5, 2015 General Smoking, Smoking Age, State Legislation, Tobacco, Public Health 0 0 Comment Read More »
DHCS extends meaningful use attestation deadlines for 2014 The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) published a final rule on September 4, 2014, that revised the meaningful use timeline. Under the rule, eligible professionals can use 2011 Edition certified EHR technology (CEHRT) or a combination of 2011 and 2014 Edition CEHRT for the 2014 EHR reporting period to demonstrate meaningful use. Eligible professionals who were scheduled to begin stage 2 in 2014 will not be required to begin stage 2 until 2015, if they could not fully implement 2014 Edition CEHRT due to delays in availability ... June 5, 2015 General, Medi-Cal EHR, Electronic Health Record, Meaningful Use, Medi-Cal, CMS 0 0 Comment Read More »
CMA submits comments on Meaningful Use Stage 3 to CMS On May 29, the California Medical Association (CMA) submitted comments to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology on the Meaningful Use Stage 3 notice of proposed rulemaking. Under the federal electronic health records (EHR) incentive programs, qualifying Medicare and Medi-Cal providers are eligible to receive incentive payments for adopting and demonstrating “meaningful use” of certified health information technology (HIT). The proposed rule, published in the Federal Register on March 30, specifies the final stage of meaningful use criteria that eligible ... June 5, 2015 General Electronic Health Record, Health Information Technology, HIT, EHR, Meaningful Use 0 0 Comment Read More »
