HME News is the monthly business newspaper for home medical equipment providers. This controlled circulation publication reaches 17,100 home medical equipment services providers, including traditional HME dealers & suppliers, hospital- and pharmacy-o
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New Products 22 www.hmenews.com / june 2016 / hme news Periodicals postage paid at Yarmouth, ME and additional mailing offce. HME News (ISSN 10913823) is published monthly by United Publications, Inc., 106 Lafayette St., PO Box 998, Yarmouth, ME 04096; 207-846-0600. Publisher assumes no responsibility for unsolicited material or prices quoted in the magazine. Contributors are responsible for proprietary classifed information. ©2016 by United Publications. All rights reserved. Reproduction, in whole or in part, without written permission of the publisher is expressly prohibited. Reprints may be obtained from The YGS Group at 717-505-9701, ext. 100. Back issues, when available, cost $7 each within the past 12 months, $12 each prior to the past 12 months. Back issue orders must be paid in advance either by check or charged to American Express, Visa, or Master Card. HME News is distributed without charge in North America to qualifed home medical equipment providers. Paid print subscriptions to those not qualifed cost $65 annually to the U.S. and Canada and $150 to all other countries. All payments must be made in U.S. funds drawn on a U.S. bank. For subscriber services, including subscription information, please call 800-869-6882. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to HME News, PO Box 47860, Plymouth, MN 55447-0860. "This time, almost nothing." Even with local companies in the mix for the original Round 2, there have been access issues, Oury says, so he can't imagine what it will be like on July 1, when CMS transi- tions to new pricing and suppliers. Just two weeks ago, Oury says he received a call from a discharge planner trying to make arrange- ments for a bed for a Medicare ben- efciary. He told her he didn't have a contract for beds and, therefore, couldn't help her. "She said, 'I can't find a bed anywhere,'" he said. "That was on a Friday. I know for a fact that this patient didn't dis- charge until Tuesday. Medicare could have bought four beds for the cost of that extended hos- pital stay. I see it all the time." The situation is even worse for nebulizers, a new product catego- ry, in the Boston bid area. None of the contract suppliers have billing addresses in the area or even the state—the closest is in Alabama. The rest? Florida, Texas, Missis- sippi and Puerto Rico. "CMS has really done themselves a number this time around," said Gary Sheehan, president and CEO of Cape Medical Supply in Sand- hard for Cubans to get HME. "I'm sure it's pretty expensive and I don't think they have what we do in the States," said Alicia Hubbard, co-owner of Home Medical Equipment and Supply in Hollywood, who expressed inter- est in providing wound care and ostomy supplies. This is why some providers are already doing business in Cuba, albeit indirectly. "Most of our customers are Cuban," said Leo Extramil, pres- ident of Hialeah, Fla.-based Four Health. "They come in and ship line." The agency awarded nine con- tracts in the mail-order catego- ry—100% of those offered—as part of a new phase of the pro- gram that kicks off July 1. That's signifcantly lower than the 20 or so it offered the frst time around. "Over a period of three years, that's a 99% reduction in sup- pliers, from 1,000 to nine," said Milam. "It's going to be devastat- ing." A study by the National Minor- ity Quality Forum, frst presented in June and recently published in the prestigious medical journal Diabetes Care, found not only decreased access for benefciaries, but also increased hospitaliza- tions and deaths in test markets. Interestingly, only three of the suppliers for the new phase of the program were awarded contracts previously: Arriva Medical, Bin- opportunities to do online ordering with real-time information regard- ing in-stock and on-order items. At the very least, every HME provider should have the option for online ordering for existing customers in the system for cash items and items that can be completed with- out extensive new documentation. Are you secure? With more digital data comes the risk of security breaches. Even at the advent of electronic health records, healthcare businesses and patients alike had major con- cerns about the security of their health data. Today, electronic health records are pervasive, cataloguing significant data on every patient's health and history. While this supports the delivery of health care, it also puts patients at risk. Even the most savvy healthcare consumers are concerned about the transfer of digital health fles, so you need to have solutions in place to reassure them of your secu- rity. Digital security measures are going to be an even more signif- cant concern in 2016 as IT in the HME industry must adapt to the changing conditions of modern healthcare. hme Eddy Hsu is the chief information offcer at Bonafde Management Systems. He can be reached at ehsu@bonafde.com. wich, Mass. "In some respects, they've done us a favor. We're already getting push back from case managers asking, 'What are we going to do?'" While concerns about out-of- state contract suppliers are very real, there may be instances where the supplier operates a hub-and- spoke business model. Its billing address may be outside of the bid area, but it may have an offce local- ly that might not serve patients but does serve as a delivery point for the area. "We're in markets that are 500 miles away, but we have three driv- ers and an RT and a warehouse guy there," said Joel Marx, chairman of Medical Service Company in Cleveland. Also, in the original Round 2, suppliers that didn't have a pres- ence in an area made plans to sub- contract or to "sell" their contract to local suppliers. In the Round 2 re-compete, however, there will be much less of that happening, pro- viders say. "That might have worked the frst time, but providers are smarter now," Oury said. "Two-plus years into it, they realize they shouldn't have taken that offer." hme out-of-state suppliers c o n t i n u e d f r o m pa g e 1 son's Home Health Care Centers and United States Medical Sup- ply. The reason is a mystery, say providers. "I would think if you served the contract well and found it to be proftable and bid again you would certainly rise the top," said Dan Gooch, owner of Pal-Med in Columbia, S.C. "It leaves us to speculate they realized that they couldn't stay proftable doing it or they choose to go in another direction." That could certainly be a pos- sibility based on the new single payment amount for test strips, which dropped from $10.41 to $8.32 per box, a decrease of nearly 21%. The low pricing once again underscores the lack of trans- parency in the bid program, says Milam. "I haven't spoken to a single person—and I don't know all of the winners—who bid lower than $8.32," he said. "I don't know how that's the median price." hme Mail order c o n t i n u e d f r o m pa g e 1 technology c o n t i n u e d f r o m pa g e 8 providers see opportunity in cuba c o n t i n u e d f r o m pa g e 1 our products to Cuba to their friends and family members." While the demand for HME may be high, doing business in Cuba does present a unique set of logistical problems, starting with payment. "God only knows what kind of payer system they have or, unfortunately, the limited fnan- cial resources these people have," said Pardo. But the biggest problem: Cuba is close, but not that close. "The distance presents war- ranty issues," Extramil said. "Also, it's very expensive to ship products to Cuba. Sometimes the product costs just as much as it does to send it." While uncertainties abound and only Congress can offcially lift the U.S.'s embargo on Cuba, providers say it's an opportunity worth looking in to. "There's no one there yet," said Extramil. "At frst there's going to be a lot of market share, because there's no competition. The frst (companies) that come in and get set up will have complete control of the island." hme Amoena Natura Xtra Light The Natura Xtra Light breast form features a slightly frmer lightweight silicone in the back layer to help stabilize the form when worn in a bra pocket. It also regulates fuctuations in body heat and reduces per- spiration behind the form while the narrow, rounded footprint doesn't overlap a natural breast or breast form on the other side. www.AmoenA.com/us mediware Information Systems CareTend BI Within a single dashboard, CareTend BI allows staff to monitor day-to- day metrics and analyze trends to anticipate where your business is headed in the coming months. www.mediwAre.com Drive|DeVilbiss healthcare Flex Swivel Cane Tip The Flex Swivel Cane Tip features a special tip that can be added to almost any cane without the use of tools for enhanced stability and superior bal- ance. The tip provides three points of contact with the ground, making it extremely stable and providing excep- tional traction. www.drivemedicAl.com Cork medical Nisus The Nisus Negative Pressure Wound Therapy pump features a built-in troubleshoot- ing guide to resolve alarms, keeping therapy intact and reducing ser- vice calls. www.corkmedicAl.com Wed. June 8 2 pm ET Change is Afoot: Is Your Ventilator Program Up to Speed? SPONSORED BY: www.hmenews.com/webcasts In this webcast, industry respected reimbursement expert Andrea Stark will interpret the new clarifcations on coding and coverage requirements for ventilators that CMS announced in May. Topics covered will include: • What to expect from the formal Ventilator NCD reconsideration request pending with CMS • A discussion of the pending legal and regulatory initiatives—will they modify the current trajectory? • What we can expect from audit activity—will the MACs offcially halt ventilator audits? • And more