Medicare to ban certain doctors from prescribing?

www.propublica.org...

A proposed rule change for Medicare:

Medicare plans to arm itself with broad new powers to better control — and potentially ban — doctors engaged in fraudulent or harmful prescribing, following a series of articles by ProPublica detailing lax oversight in its drug program.

And the agency will tighten a loophole that has allowed doctors to prescribe to patients in the drug program, known as Part D, even when they were not officially enrolled with Medicare. Under the new rules, doctors and other providers must formally enroll if they want to write prescriptions to the 36 million people in Part D. This requires them to verify their credentials and disclose professional discipline and criminal history.

And the scariest of all:

Giving its outside fraud contractor the ability to more easily investigate suspicions of fraud. Currently, the contractor cannot directly access patient medical charts to assess whether the patient actually saw the doctor or had a condition that warranted the medication. The contractor must go back to the insurers, which then request the records from doctors or pharmacies.

Under the rule change, the contractor would be given the power to access the records directly.

Basically most doctor's offices and hospitals have ALREADY been forced to go to Electronic Medical Records (EMR) . If this proposed rule goes through, the Fed Bureaucrats (and their "contractors") will have the power to see the medical diagnosis before the patient even leaves the office--and whether or not the physician prescribed an "appropriate" drug.

reply to post by Tusks


I assume there are doctors on the other end of this process to analyze the diagnosis of the patient's doctor to make these decision's.

What ? why you laughing ? how else could the government make a decision as to what drug is appropriate for a person's health and well being ??

That's just the beginning...

The Nanny State is officially in your Doctors Office.

This Drunk with power Administration has stolen Americans Right to Privacy.

Our medical records are there for all to see.

Except of course if you got exempted as some form of payback. 😷

Yup, medical TSA agents. awesome.

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds. Whether that be pain meds or other classes that may not be life supporting, but life isn't worth squat without them for daily existence.

Of course tho...the priority is always to punish the millions to catch the hundreds. We've become a nation where it is FAR better to bust 100 innocent people to prove their innocence..than let ONE guilty man walk free.

It's 100% precisely the opposite, literally polar opposite, to the very values America was created with....and I'm touched very directly and personally on this story by 3 different family members in chronic levels of medical support for the rest of their lives. Anything which makes their life harder, makes me wish all the more for politicians to rot in a special level of hell.

Pardon my uncharacteristic harshness ...but this is unforgivable for what "good ideas" are doing to REAL PEOPLE who suffer while the bean counters make sure every damn bean is counted in JUST such a way as to make them happy.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds.

Or it could be a way to catch and bust doctors that are nothing more than professional pill pushers.

buster2010
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds.

Or it could be a way to catch and bust doctors that are nothing more than professional pill pushers.

Buster,

Should everybody suffer to catch a few Doctors?

The Government has no business in the Doctors Office.

Besides, how can it not be a violation of our 4th Amendment Rights?

buster2010
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds.

Or it could be a way to catch and bust doctors that are nothing more than professional pill pushers.

Or it could be a way for the IPAB board to decide on one treatment that is one-size-fits-all for a disease such as migraine for example and if your doctor and you have discovered that the drug in question doesn't work for you and that another one does work much better ... well, you're SOL because that other drug may not be "approved" and thus is not allowed.

Some diseases are highly individual, and doctors need to have the freedom to try a wide range of treatments to find one that works well for the individual.

buster2010
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds.

Or it could be a way to catch and bust doctors that are nothing more than professional pill pushers.

There are already easier ways to find the pill-pushers---most states have prescription monitoring programs, in which physicians can look up their patient's other narcotic prescriptions filled in the state. But conversely, the state can monitor the kind and amount and numbers of controlled substances written by any physician and filled in the state.

reply to post by buster2010

Oh, I get the purpose buster. I get in in Billboard size neon lettering. In fact, I've seen it on flyers taped to the medical office walls for the entire month of Jan. 2013..about a year ago.

Like I said... better to screw millions so hundreds can be busted.

Once upon a time, in a nation I can barely remember anymore, we had a value. That was a simple value. It read something like.... Better that 100 guilty men go free than that ONE innocent man be convicted.

THAT is what has flipped entirely for the relentless hunt for wrongdoing ...by some of the most corrupt pieces of garbage to ever warm an elected seat in office.

whyamIhere

buster2010
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds.

Or it could be a way to catch and bust doctors that are nothing more than professional pill pushers.

Buster,

Should everybody suffer to catch a few Doctors?

The Government has no business in the Doctors Office.

Besides, how can it not be a violation of our 4th Amendment Rights?

If the person is paying for it then it would be a violation of their 4th but the government is the one doing the paying. I want to know where my tax dollars are going and if a person has a legitimate illness they will get their meds.

Tusks

buster2010
reply to post by Wrabbit2000

 

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds.

Or it could be a way to catch and bust doctors that are nothing more than professional pill pushers.

There are already easier ways to find the pill-pushers---most states have prescription monitoring programs, in which physicians can look up their patient's other narcotic prescriptions filled in the state. But conversely, the state can monitor the kind and amount and numbers of controlled substances written by any physician and filled in the state.

We are not talking about the state but rather the Fed.

reply to post by buster2010


Fair enough, if the Government is paying.

Yet, there is the government holding out a cup for me to tinkle in.

They don't pay a dime for me. Yet I'm paying over $1500.00 a year to be tested.

Obama said we would save money....😄

reply to post by buster2010


You think the Federales don't have access to state PMPs?

reply to post by Wrabbit2000

Like I said... better to screw millions so hundreds can be busted.

Millions are not going to be screwed. As it says in the article they are only going after the pill pushers.

For the first time, the agency would have the authority to kick out physicians and other providers who engage in abusive prescribing. It could also take such action if providers’ licenses have been suspended or revoked by state regulators or if they were restricted from prescribing painkillers and other controlled substances.

So I guess some drug addict that isn't given their fix is going to get screwed.

reply to post by buster2010


Government isn't paying. *I* am paying. You are paying...Government is US...and US is getting real tired of being attacked, pursued, hunted and persecuted by OUR Government at every turn ..for the spectre of "bad guys out there somewhere that need caught"

How many enforcement efforts does this make over the last few years now on the same issue? How many initiatives now to root out fraud?

Their Healthcare solution is an unmitigated disaster and people are and will be suffering from that alone...Add more key stone cops crap like this to it? We won't even know which is most directly responsible for the suffering. The Health System itself or the near clinically paranoid heights of "mole hunting", figuratively speaking.

I'll HAPPILY accept some fraud happens ..because it does and always will. Much of that fraud is directly attributable to 500+ scumbags on Capital Hill ..and who are gleefully pushing new Witch Hunts like this, atop the MANY MANY hunts that have come before ....

Will we simply be in perpetual hunt mode now? Not just in medicine...but the paranoia at direct expense of innocent people seems to be the norm now and not even worth mentioning for anger to many, anymore.

whyamIhere
reply to post by buster2010

 

Fair enough, if the Government is paying.

Yet, there is the government is holding out a cup for me to tinkle in.

They don't pay a dime for me. Yet I'm paying over $1500.00 a year to be tested.

Obama said we would save money....😄

edit on 7-1-2014 by whyamIhere because: Came on to my medication...

Do you work for the government or a company that handles government contracts? If not then it isn't the government that is making you pee in a cup but rather the place you work for. Place the blame where it really belongs instead of blaming the government.

reply to post by buster2010


Buster.... I didn't work for the Government. I didn't work for Government Contracts. I never came closer to a Government agent than a DOT inspection at a scalehouse. I was under 100% mandatory drug testing, 24/7 on a must-show basis for over 15 years. Everyone in transportation is ....and that is but ONE area where you don't need to have anything whatsoever to do with the Government directly, to be pissing in a cup at their whim.

I happened to see the reasons for transportation..but Government is still reaching down our pants to extract biological samples for analysis because they deem their concerns above our rights. It's a principle thing.

Perhaps they don't want Medicare to be used for nefarious purposes.

One example out of many.....too many.

Although many types of prescription drugs are abused, there is currently a growing, deadly epidemic of prescription painkiller abuse. Nearly three out of four prescription drug overdoses are caused by prescription painkillers—also called opioid pain relievers. The unprecedented rise in overdose deaths in the US parallels a 300% increase since 1999 in the sale of these strong painkillers. These drugs were involved in 14,800 overdose deaths in 2008, more than coc aine and heroin combined.

The misuse and abuse of prescription painkillers was responsible for more than 475,000 emergency department visits in 2009, a number that nearly doubled in just five years. More than 12 million people reported using prescription painkillers nonmedically in 2010, that is, using them without a prescription or for the feeling they cause.

Most prescription painkillers are prescribed by primary care and internal medicine doctors and dentists, not specialists. Roughly 20% of prescribers prescribe 80% of all prescription painkillers.

Policy Impact: Prescription Painkiller Overdoses

buster2010

Another roadblock and another way to rob chronic patients of their quality of life meds.

Or it could be a way to catch and bust doctors that are nothing more than professional pill pushers.

Here in Florida there are several measures in place to catch doctors who do this. In my opinion things are getting better and many of the phoney pain pill clinics have been busted.

Why add more red tape when there are already laws in place?

On a side note, it appears addicts and pushers are unable to get pain pills with the ease they did in the past and heroin is making a big comeback. Coincidence?