The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has released the “Hospital Inpatient Prospective Payment System (IPPS)” Proposed Rule for Fiscal Year 2019.
This rule, when finalized, will set the rates for bone marrow and cord blood transplants. The rule, as it stands, remains silent on the long-overdue fix to the reimbursement method used to calculate how much hospitals are reimbursed for providing bone marrow and cord blood transplants. The National Marrow Donor Program (NMDP)/Be The Match has worked extensively with CMS to address inadequate reimbursement for stem cell transplant, and in particular, reimbursement for donor search and cell acquisition costs.
The financial losses incurred by transplant centers to treat the approximately 1,200 Medicare patients each year threatens their viability and may result in serious access issues for Medicare patients. Hospitals lose thousands of dollars on every Medicare patient they treat. Patients who do not have access to transplant will face expensive, likely futile alternative treatment options. In most cases, transplant is the best option for survival.
We are asking for the same fix that is part of the “Protect Access to Cellular Transplant (PACT) Act” (H.R. 4215). This legislation would require CMS to pay for the acquisition costs of bone marrow and cord blood using the same separate payment method that is used for solid organs. If CMS does not act in this rulemaking, the U.S. Congress will have to pass the legislation to force the fix.
