Dear AuntMinnie Member,
This just in -- the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday passed a short-term fix to Medicare's sustainable growth rate (SGR) formula, averting what would have been a 21.2% pay cut in physician payments as of January 1.
The SGR Band-Aid was included in a defense appropriations bill that the House passed on a 395 to 34 vote. The provision would postpone the cuts until March 2010, presumably giving Congress time to repair an SGR formula that everyone agrees is broken but few can agree on how to fix.
Previous legislation that would have implemented a more permanent fix has been delayed due to concerns that it might contribute to the federal government's worsening debt load. But if a healthcare reform package is passed, as seems increasingly likely, it could provide a clean slate for a permanent SGR overhaul in the new year.
Learn more by clicking here for the story in our Imaging Center Digital Community, where you'll also find an article on the American College of Radiology's recent critique of Medicare's physician payment rates for 2010.
CT sees myocardial edema
In clinical news, a new article in our Cardiac Imaging Digital Community indicates that CT may have caught up to MRI in visualizing pericardial fluid associated with myocardial infarction.
In an animal study, German researchers compared CT to MRI to determine whether CT was as good as MRI in detecting myocardial edema, which can help differentiate acute from chronic myocardial infarction. Their goal was to see if CT could help detect at-risk myocardial tissue that might benefit from reperfusion therapy.
Learn what they discovered by clicking here, or visit the Cardiac Imaging Digital Community at cardiac.auntminnie.com.
