HIMSS has issued a six-pronged proposal to expand access to telehealth for Medicare beneficiaries, one of three Congressional Asks announced earlier this month.
The non-profit parent company of HIMSS Media and mHealth News said the three directives focus on the use of healthcare IT to save lives, improve care outcomes and reduce costs. They're made every year in advance of National Health IT Week.
"Telehealth services, and the technology that supports them, can expand access to higher quality care for underserved communities (both urban and rural), address provider shortages, facilitate proactive disease prevention and chronic care management and improve patient and provider satisfaction," HIMSS officials said in a press release. "Quixotically, current law prevents CMS from reimbursing most providers and health systems for telehealth services and remote patient monitoring."
[See also: Congress gets another chance to advance telemedicine]
"HIMSS urges Congress to amend current law and take steps to require CMS to remove barriers to deployment and encourage broader types of technologies that will improve access and quality and reduce cost," the release stated.
Specifically, HIMSS is asking Congress to:
- Expand the originating sites currently allowed by the CMS "to include interactions with patients from wherever the patient is located, including the home, where cost-effective and clinically appropriate;"
- Amend current regulations which restrict telehealth coverage to "Health Professional Shortage Areas;"
- Expand store-and-forward telehealth services to include long-term passive monitoring of chronic diseases (Alaska and Hawaii are currently testing these capabilities in federal demonstration projects);
- Allow healthcare providers to expand active monitoring services beyond real-time voice and video technology;
- Update Current Procedural Technology (CPT) and Healthcare Common Procedural Coding System (HCPCS) codes to allow home-based monitoring services and exchanges between clinicians and patients, such as shared decision-making; and
- Coordinate federal and state efforts to license clinicians for telehealth services across state lines.
The other two Congressional Asks issued by HIMSS call on lawmakers to support robust interoperability and health information exchange and support the healthcare industry's efforts to fight cyber crime.
HIMSS also took on telehealth in its 2014 Congressional Asks. The organization asked that Congress "should pass legislation that enables the nationwide realization of the full benefits of telehealth services: expanding access to quality care, controlling costs, enhancing secure interoperability of health information and improving the quality of care for rural and underserved populations."
See also:
CHIME calls on Congress to support telehealth
Congress tries to tie telehealth expansion to Medicare reimbursements
