DHPA has submitted comments on the importance of modernizing the federal physician self-referral law (Stark Law) to the U.S. House Ways and Means Health Subcommittee’s Medicare Red Tape Relief Project, an initiative aimed at “delivering relief from the regulations and mandates that impede innovation, drive up costs, and ultimately stand in the way of delivering […]
Modernizing the Stark Law
The Digestive Health Physician Association supports the bipartisan Medicare Care Coordination Improvement Act of 2019 (H.R 2282, S. 966), which promotes care coordination and will enable physicians to participate more fully in the value-based payment models incentivized by the bipartisan Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 (MACRA).
The legislation has the full support of 27 physician organizations representing more than 500,000 physicians who care for millions of Medicare patients.
The Medicare Care Coordination Improvement Act would modernize the outdated “Stark” self-referral law that poses barriers to care coordination. Congress recognized the Stark Law hinders care coordination when it authorized the Secretary at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to waive the self-referral and anti-kickback prohibitions for Accountable Care Organizations. MACRA’s full potential can only be achieved by modernizing this law for physician-led alternative payment models (APMs) as well.
The bill will provide CMS with the regulatory authority to create exceptions under the Stark Law for APMs and to remove barriers in the current law to the development and operation of such arrangements.
U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow visits Huron Gastroenterology
U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) visited DHPA member, Huron Gastroenterology, and met with the group’s physicians regarding healthcare issues being debated in the U.S. Congress. DHPA Board member, Dr. Naresh Gunaratnam, who also serves as research director at Huron Gastro, and his colleagues discussed with Sen. Stabenow the importance of preserving the high quality, cost […]
DHPA Comment Letter on MACRA Proposed Rule
DHPA today filed comments in response to CMS’s proposed rule implementing the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) and Incentives for Alternative Payment Models (APMs). This major proposed rule establishes new ground rules for physician payments under the MACRA legislation passed by Congress last year. MACRA represents a fundamental change in the way physicians are paid […]
Modernizing the Stark Law for MACRA (Infographic)
As our healthcare system shifts from a fee-for-service model to value-based care, two payment structures incentivized by the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act (MACRA) are the Merit-Based Incentive Payment System (MIPS) and Alternative Payment Models (APMs).
Policy Recommendations for Modernizing the Stark Law
The physician self-referral law, know as the “Stark Law,” was passed by Congress in 1989 and substantially amended in 1993. Health care delivery has changed dramatically since then, but this antiquated state has not kept pace with new and innovative delivery models.