In observance of the Jewish Holiday of Sukkot, next week’s post will be on Wednesday, October 12.

WHITE HOUSE:

The White House focused this week on their ongoing response to the devastating impact of Hurricane Ian, efforts they’ve taken for suicide prevention and a new foreign relations effort focused on a “Pacific Islands” partnership. For those of you in Florida, the President declared a state of emergency there, unlocking federal and state funding available to assist with recovery. FEMA has created a central resource page for those impacted. Three other items of note:

• At the White House conference on Hunger this week, they announced $8 billion of initiatives aimed at solving challenges related to food access. More below in the CMS section for two state specific initiatives, but there are opportunities aimed improving seniors access to SNAP and other benefits, something that your residents may be interested in. You can access the full roadmap here (PDF).

• More below in the HHS section, but they announced the release of more than $225 million in ARP funding to invest in the community health workforce.

• Back in July, the United States & Israel agreed to a “high-level” dialogue regarding a partnership between the two countries. They held the first meeting this week and provided a few more specifics on areas of focus. There may be opportunities for those of you with investments in Israeli tech companies, particularly those focused on health & AI.

CONGRESS:

Congress passed a short-term funding bill that will keep the government funded at its current levels (with one major notable exception, see below) through December 16^th. With this passage, Congress is, for all intents and purposes, out until after the Midterms with no votes scheduled till mid-November. The goal of this Continuing Resolution (CR) was to get through the Midterms and gain clarity on the political makeup of each House, which will determine the extent of next year’s budget (to say nothing of other Congressional priorities). Depending on how the elections shake out, the lame-duck session (November/December) is going to be extremely packed. A few other notes:

• The CR did add funding for FEMA to assist with aid in response to Hurricane Ian, something that can be helpful to those of you with facilities in impacted areas.

• A popular, bipartisan effort to restrict Congressional ability to make stock trades failed to move forward, leading to very public in-fighting among Democrats. This is notable in that in the unlikely event Democrats hold onto the House, it can have implications for Congressional leadership.

• With Congress done, everyone’s attention will be focused on the Midterms. Rollcall has a good overview of what’s on the ballot throughout the country.

• 538 makes a persuasive case that, while in the short-term progressive candidates are losing elections, they are pushing the party to the left and slowly picking up races where there is no incumbent, something to monitor beyond the midterms and into 2024. The Washington Post makes a similar case.

AGENCIES:

HHS announced that Medicare Part D and MA plans will have lower premiums next year. You can access the entire, state-by-state fact sheet that provide more detail here (PDF).

HHS released two studies this week related to prescription drug pricing and spending over the last several years. The idea is to highlight trends in prescription drug spending that will be impacted when the Inflation Reduction Act’ provisions related to drug pricing take effect:

• Price increases on prescription drugs from 2016-2022. You can access a copy here (PDF).
• Spending on prescription drugs from 2016-2021. You can access a copy here (PDF).

As mentioned above, HHS, via HRSA, released $225 million for development of the community health workforce. A full list of recipients can be found here. They also released $40 million for the development of public health workers.

Building on the White House initiative related to hunger, HHS approved two state specific initiatives that will allow Massachusetts and Oregon to use Medicaid funding for medically appropriate food planning and meals, among other initiatives.

The OIG at HHS released an audit of HRSA’s oversight on PRF spending on healthcare providers in 2020, highlighting the need for further efforts by HHS to improve oversight on the program. Given the announcement, it’s something to monitor. You can access the report in brief here (PDF) and the complete report here (PDF).

They also did a detailed analysis of a specific dialysis group that highlighted significant compliance issues with Medicare billing requirements. You can access the report in brief here (PDF) and the complete report here (PDF).

CMS announced a new effort to provide more transparency on common ownership among nursing homes. The data is now available at their central data hub.

Specifically for facilities in Florida, CMS outlined the waivers available for providers within the state as a result of Hurricane Ian.

CMS also sent a letter to state officials reminding them that they must move from a RUGS based system to a PDPM based system by October 2023. You can access a copy of the letter here (PDF). You can read eCap Intel Cofounder Marc Zimmet's comments on CMS letter right here at the eCap Intel community.

The FDA released final guidance related to the use of AI in tech that diagnoses sepsis. While specific to sepsis, this has significant implications for other diagnostic technologies. You can access the guidance here (PDF direct download).

We mentioned the Supreme Court ruling in June on the 340B drug payment program. A court ruled this week that HHS needs to end the cuts in question immediately.

Other:

On the non-agency front:

• Medpac held their quarterly meeting, looking at different elements of long-term care. MEDPAC is simply an advisory group to Congress, but it’s an insightful look at how they are approaching hot topics in long-term care including an analysis of a new type of payment system (PDF) and a report on minimum staffing (PDF).

• The NY Times took a hard look at non-profit hospitals and their billing practices, something that can lead to more regulation on non-profits. In a similar vein, Kaiser Health News looked at hospital billing systems and relationships with urgent care facilities.

• Harvard released a study that looked at hospitals located in flood zones along the coast. While aimed at hospitals, this has implications for all healthcare providers in those regions. You can access it here (PDF).

• Kaiser Health News looked at what happened when “private equity” took over long term care facilities in Britain. Unfortunately, this can have policy implications on here in the US.

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