Robert E. Wanerman, a Member of the Firm in the Health Care and Life Sciences practice, in the firm’s Washington, DC, office, was quoted in Bloomberg BNA’s Health Care Daily Report, in “Benefits, Risks Seen with Medicare Device Pay Rule,” by Michael Williamson.
Following is an excerpt:
When a manufacturer wants to bring a new device to market, they confront a problem about how to get it covered, Robert Wanerman, an attorney with Epstein Becker & Green PC in Washington, said July 8.
Specifically, in the outpatient area, providers get paid on a lump-sum basis for each episode of care, Wanerman told Bloomberg BNA. Thus, if a manufacturer has a new technology, outpatient providers may decline to offer procedures for that device, because it's not included in the lump-sum payment, he said.
Wanerman said that the CMS developed pass-through payments for devices to allow Medicare to cover new medical technologies. Devices typically approved for a pass-through payment tend to be high-tech products, he explained.
Pass-through payments allow the CMS to accommodate innovation, Wanerman said.
