A group of U.S. Congressional representatives has sent a letter to President Barack Obama, pointing out the value of medical imaging technology to the nation's healthcare system.
The June 11 letter was signed by 57 members of Congress, and comes as the Obama administration is proposing a sweeping overhaul of the nation's healthcare system in an effort to reduce costs and improve access. The letter urges Obama to "reject arbitrary cuts to imaging services or changes to the utilization rate assumption."
The latter statement is in reference to one of the more controversial proposals under consideration, which would change the utilization rate that the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) uses to calculate relative value units (RVUs) that determine reimbursement rates. Currently, that rate assumes that imaging facilities operate 50% of the time they're open for business; CMS is considering a proposal to increase that to 75%.
Changing the formula could lead to a 40% drop in reimbursement for the technical component of imaging exams, according to some industry observers.
The letter goes on to state that "we know that each $1 spent on imaging services, correlates to approximately $3 in total healthcare savings." It also points out that the New England Journal of Medicine recently named medical imaging as one of the 11 developments that have changed the face of medicine during the last millennium.
The letter concludes that the medical imaging community has worked with members of Congress and patient groups, physicians, and manufacturers to implement substantive policy changes in medical imaging, as evidenced by the Medicare Improvements for Patients and Providers Act (MIPPA) of 2008, and that this example should be taken as a model for future policy changes.
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