Medical Equipment Industry to Tackle “Suicide Bidding” and Access to Homecare at NCAMES Meeting

June 1, 2010 - PRLog -- (Raleigh and Wrightsville Beach, N.C.) North Carolina’s leader in home medical equipment advocacy and education, NCAMES, will be holding its Summer Meeting June 23-25 in Wrightsville Beach to help educate members on how to preserve access to homecare for seniors and people with disabilities while fighting “suicide bidding” on government contracts.

In addition, North Carolina native Erika Bogan, Ms. Wheelchair America 2010, will be giving a motivational speech on how mobility products have helped her recover from a debilitating 2002 motor vehicle accident which left her a parapalegic at the age of 21.

“We are fighting hard to promote a bipartisan legislative solution in the U.S. Congress to correct irrational Federal Medicare regulations enacted in 2009 that are forcing our members to submit unsustainable bids just to continue to provide services to seniors and disabled men, women, and children,” NCAMES Executive Director Beth Bowen said. According to Bowen, the Medicare bidding rules enacted by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services in Washington, D.C. focusing on lowest-cost bids ignore the intent of Congressional directives centering on preserving access to quality care.

“All the CMS bidding rules are doing are forcing North Carolina consumers to abandon their trusted local providers and opening the doors to inferior care from unproven, out-of-state vendors,” she said, adding, “Literally, patients in our state can no longer choose who they want to use for their life-sustaining home medical equipment. Under the CMS rules, they have to choose from a government list built not from open competition in the marketplace where the best providers rise to the top, but from bureaucratic number crunching where pretty much anyone can win a bid as long as they’re cheap.”

Member sessions at the Summer Meeting include workshops on patient documentation; compliance issues; dealing with Medicare bidding rules; legislation coming out of Washington, D.C.; and various ways to improve quality care for patients.

The special event of the Summer Meeting is the presentation by Erika Bogan, who has used her situation to motivate other spinal cord injured patients and people with disabilities to pursue their dreams in life. Her work in advocating for the 54 million Americans living with disabilities includes establishing organizations to help motivate and supply resources and appearing at industry events, oftentimes showcasing how she has overcome her disability by surfing.

A working mom, Bogan is pursuing a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology, in addition to her many public appearances and speaking engagements. Her appearance at the NCAMES Summer Meeting is sponsored by Van Products Mobility of Raleigh and Wilmington.

More information on the NCAMES Summer Meeting and H.R. 3790, proposed legislation to correct flaws in the CMS “suicide bidding” program, can be found online at NCAMES.org.

With close to 300 member companies and growing, the North Carolina Association for Medical Equipment Services (NCAMES) is the statewide leader in preserving access to safe, affordable, and therapeutic home medical equipment. We provide advocacy and education to home medical equipment (HME) providers statewide dedicated to helping North Carolinas growing senior population and patients of all ages gain more mobility and experience a high quality of life in the comfort and privacy of their own homes. NCAMES was instrumental in passing the nations first HME licensure law which has been working to ensure quality home health care since 1995, and fully supports pending legislation H.R. 3790 to continue HME access for patients in need. For more information, visit www.ncames.org or call (919)-387-1221.