Sunday, September 1, 2019

Alex Azar (Secretary of HH&S) writes about possible new kidney policies

In the New Hampshire Business Review, the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services writes about the recent executive order* concerning caring for kidney patients:

President is providing hope for kidney patients
August 29, 2019  Alex M. Azar

"To prevent kidney disease and provide more treatment options, we’re launching new ways for Medicare to pay for kidney care. For example, nephrologists will soon be able to receive bonuses for preventing the progress of kidney disease in their patients. We’ll give providers a financial stake in getting their patients healthy, as opposed to just paying them for performing more procedures.

"We have also proposed a Medicare initiative to give about half of America’s dialysis providers new incentives to provide patients with dialysis at home or even in their beds at night, rather than having them travel to dialysis centers. Today, only 6.1% of kidney patients in New Hampshire receive dialysis at home, an option that’s much more common in other countries.
...
"To provide more kidney transplants, we will be revising how kidneys are obtained from deceased organ donors, allowing better identification of kidneys for transplant. The executive order also calls for us to expand support for the generous living donors who choose to donate organs. Changing how we identify transplantable kidneys from deceased donors, by itself, could produce life-saving organs for an additional 17,000 Americans each year — including some of the 87 individuals currently waiting for a kidney in New Hampshire.
**************

*See earlier post:

Tuesday, July 16, 2019



HT: Frank McCormick

No comments: