Advocacy & Practice Updates — Advocacy & Practice
ASRS Meets With OMB to Discuss In-Office Surgery and Physician Payment
This past week, ASRS met with the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) twice to discuss key elements of the 2023 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule proposed rule before the final rule is published. While CMS writes and implements Medicare policy, OMB has final say for the administration over any regulatory action.
Joined by the rest of the ophthalmic community, ASRS Federal Affairs Committee Chairman Michael Lai, MD, PhD, FASRS, shared his concerns with OMB about the prospect of performing retinal surgery in an office setting. He explained the need for additional trained personnel to manage anesthesia and the potential difficulty of equipping an office surgery suite with all the necessary equipment. ASRS and other groups reiterated our recommendation that CMS not move forward with creating non-facility RVUs for several ophthalmic codes until there is independent, peer-reviewed data demonstrating that procedures can be performed safely.
In conjunction with the Alliance of Specialty Medicine, we also met with OMB to share our concerns about potential cuts to physician reimbursement due to budget neutrality. In addition, we recommended reforms to the MIPS program to make it less burdensome and more clinically relevant to specialists.
The final rule is expected to be released in early November.
(Published 10.19.22)