Now Available -- Summary of HIT Provisions in Stimulus Bill

The ACC has created a summary of the “American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009” that includes recommendations for members. ARRA authorizes $17.2 billion in incentives through Medicare and Medicaid to assist providers in adopting health information technology (IT). From 2011-2015, physicians that demonstrate “meaningful use” of electronic health record (EHR) technology and performance during the reporting period of each payment year will be eligible for positive payment incentives. Beginning in 2015, physicians who are not meaningfully using EHRs will receive negative Medicare payment updates. Read the complete summary.

In related news, ACC Informatics Committee Co-Chair Dr. James Tcheng, M.D., F.A.C.C., discusses the role of health IT in improving clinical quality, and the tools and resources available to ACC members interested in implementing health IT in a recent Cardiosource Video News (CVN) segment. Dr. Tcheng also outlines the incentives available under the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services’ (CMS) e-prescribing incentive program. View the CVN video.

Obama Recommits to Reform

President Barack Obama on Tuesday recommitted himself to reforming the U.S. health care system at a joint meeting of the House and Senate. How health care reform will be funded will be included in his budget, which will be submitted to Congress on Feb. 26. Obama on Tuesday said that high medical costs have caused bankruptcies, lost U.S. jobs and an increasing federal deficit. The budget faces a large strain because of entitlement programs like Medicare, which will continue to increase as the population ages. However, he said this strain can be lessened in part by slowing the growing costs of Medicare.
Obama will hold a White House forum next week to discuss health care that will include medical providers, health care businesses and a bipartisan group of lawmakers, Bloomberg reports. Additional coverage is available.

House, Senate Reintroduce HEART Act
Sens. Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Reps. Lois Capps (D-Calif.) and Mary Bono Mack (R-Calif.) earlier this month re-introduced the “HEART for Women Act,” (H.R. 1032/S. 422). The bill would:

• Provide for programs to educate health care providers and women about the prevalence, warning signs and treatment of heart disease in women
• Authorize Medicare to conduct an awareness campaign for older women
• Expand the WISEWOMAN (Well-Integrated Screening and Evaluation for Women Across the Nation) to improve heart disease and stroke screening for low-income women to all 50 states
• Require the FDA to report health data by gender, race and ethnicity in order to shed new light on how drugs work among specific populations

The ACC this week signed onto a joint letter in support of the bill. The letter states the need for “cardiovascular research focused on gender-specific disease indicators to shape guidelines for women, which should improve care and treatment.” The ACC encourages members to contact their representatives and urge them to co-sponsor the bill. Dial the Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121 to be connected to your representatives.

FDA News Updates

FDA has granted pre-market approval to C.R. Bard’s LifeStent FlexStar and FlexStar XL vascular stent systems for treatment of occlusive disease in proximal popliteal arteries and superficial femoral arteries. Data from a two-year clinical trial indicate that the stent demonstrated a freedom from target lesion revascularization of 78 percent, compared to 42 percent for percutaneous transluminal angioplasty alone, according to the company. More information is available from Cardiovascular Business magazine.

QUALITY

Supporting Research for Guidelines Crucial, JAMA Article States

The Journal of the American Medical Association on Feb. 24 released an article by Tricoci, et al., on the importance of funding clinical research, including comparative effectiveness research, to determine the best ways to diagnose and treat heart disease. The paper is an important message to the new Administration, Congress and the nation about the need to invest more in science, medical evidence and clinical comparative effectiveness. However, accompanying the article is an editorial that suggest that ACC/American Heart Association clinical practice guidelines lack critical evidence support and are “cookbooks” to practicing medicine.

ACC President Douglas Weaver says, “The editorial implies that we should go back thirty years to when a thousand different physicians made a thousand different care plans based on their personal judgments, biases and even lack of knowledge of rigorous scientific findings.” He continues, “… [T]o remove clinical practice guidelines based on the best available evidence would add even greater variability with medical mistakes and inadequate value for the dollars spent.” Read additional coverage on The Lewin Report, ACC’s online member forum.