If you are interested in participating in this exciting effort, please contact Janie Knipper or Candy Steele. We will coach and train you in the information you need to know. Your participation will help us pass much needed legislation for our cardiac and pulmonary rehab programs, and could even mean a trip for you to Washington, DC! 

IACPR Members

We need your help for Legislative Action!

It's time again to send letters to Iowa Senators & Representatives who have not yet signed-on to our much-needed legislation! 

Will you please do it today? Our Cardiac and Pulmonary Rehab programs are depending on it!

We've provided two sample letters you can simple copy and paste: 

1.       To Senators re: Senate Bill #1440 (S 1440)

2.       To Representatives re: house Bill #4824 (HR 4824)

Address your letters as follows: 

To a Senator	To a Representative
The Honorable  ( full name ) United States Senate Washington, DC  20510	The Honorable  ( full name ) United States House of Representatives  Washington, DC  20515

 

Given the number of cardiac & pulmonary rehab programs and patients in Iowa, we should be able to get our elected officials to show more support! Please persuade them to do so by either fax or email. Due to anthrax and other terrorist threats, paper mail is not accepted. 

 

Click here for listing of Senators and Representatives with their contact information. 

Thank you for your participation in this effort to permanently secure

Medicare coverage for Cardiac & Pulmonary Rehabilitation!

Your letters will count!!

October 27, 2006

9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Sponsored by Iowa Health Des Moines Cardiac Rehabilitation Department

Location: Cardiac Rehabilitation Department at Iowa Lutheran Hospital, Des Moines                        

Purpose and Intended Audience

This one-day workshop is designed to provide healthcare professionals with basic information and resources to handle day-to-day operations in an outpatient hospital-based cardiac rehab program. Information will be provided to assist participants in compliance with CMS regulatory guidelines and JCAHO standards. Participants will gain knowledge of necessary program components, and receive a brief introduction to the AACVPR Program certification process.

This workshop is appropriate for RNs, exercise physiologists, physical therapists and other allied health personnel who will be responsible for direct patient contact within the cardiac rehab setting. This workshop may serve as a formal orientation to cardiac rehab and is valuable for the health professional who is new to this specialty area.

Education Credits

CEUs have been applied for by Iowa Approved Provider #31, Central Iowa Health System.

Objectives

Upon completion of this workshop, the participant should be able to:

• Describe general and necessary components of a cardiac rehab program
• Discuss appropriate patient referrals to cardiac rehab, and learn about marketing strategies to boost referrals
• Describe documentation guidelines relevant to patient care
• Identify minimum and optimal data collection required for quality assessment and outcome measurement
• Identify potential barriers to patient attendance or compliance and discuss compliance-enhancing strategies
• Describe appropriate patient goals, including MET level
• State effective ways to teach and document patient education                                                                                 

Faculty

Laura Mackaman, RN, BSN, MS

Laurin Norland, RN-C, BSN, MS, ACCN-C

Marcia Pitcock, RN, BSN, MS, FAACVPR

Susan Siefkas, RN, BSN

Location and Fees

Class size is on a first-come, first-served basis, and limited to the first 12 registered participants. Registration deadline is October 13, 2006.

The cost for this workshop is $110 per person and includes all materials, a lunch voucher and afternoon refreshments. Inquiries regarding program or registration may be directed to Susan Siefkas at (515) 263-5488 or e-mail email Susan here. Confirmation will be emailed to all registrants prior to the workshop date.

The workshop will be held in the Cardiac / Pulmonary Rehab Department at Iowa Lutheran Hospital, 700 E University Ave., Des Moines, Iowa. Detailed directions will accompany the confirmation email.

We were notified by Cahaba that there have been some denied claims for the new diagnoses for cardiac rehabilitation services. They discovered that the claims edit was not turned off on 6/21/06 as intended, but has since been fixed. They have identified any claims that were denied and they will be adjusted to pay. Any claims that are currently being developed will be released for payment. You do NOT need to appeal these denials, as Cahaba is doing what they can to remedy the situation. Please make your billing/accounting offices aware of this error.

Many of you have contacted us about the NCD for Cardiac Rehab, specifically the 93797 CPT code and its implication for use with education, counseling, and risk factor modification. We were originally told by Cahaba that these services would be covered under this code since the word “exercise” does not appear in the CPT description and it is clear by the language in 20-10 that CMS recognizes Cardiac Rehab as a program which must contain components other than exercise. Many of our hospitals put processes in place to bill for these components, such as nutrition education, risk factor modification, smoking cessation, and stress management.

We have been informed by Cahaba that the patient must exercise at each session in order to legitimately bill for these services. Dr. Greg McKinney, Cahaba Medical Director, attended a meeting where all of the Fiscal Intermediary CMDs were present. They were in agreement, that although "other" services are covered as part of the Cardiac Rehab (counseling, risk factors, etc.), each session must contain exercise.

As you well know, reimbursement issues surface regularly, and interpretations to the regulations can change. Please check back to the IACPR website for updates.

CMS has revised the language in Manual 100-3 § 20.10. You can read the entire memo here.

As of of June 21, 2006, you can now submit bills for Cardiac Rehabilitation services to CMS. The "MLN Matters" artlcle (MM4401) addressing this is now available on the CMS Website or through your facility's billing office. As the decision was effective 03/22/06, any services performed after that date will be covered. There is an allowable billable period of 18 months after services are performed.

The 2006 Iowa Heart & Lung Games will be held on Saturday, July 15 at Grand View College in Des Moines.  This will be the last year it is being held so we would encourage you to recruit patients to participate.  The Heart & Lung Games offer a unique opportunity for friendly competition among patients with similar health conditions.  The Games include the following:  horseshoes, bowling, prediction walk and bike, golf putt, basketball shoot, and of course the bake-off.  Last year there were some very good baked goods entered.  Yum!!

Please contact Nancy Lane-Gipson at (319)356-8396 or nancy-lane-gipson@uiowa.edu to request an information packet.  The registration deadline is June 19 so don't delay.  It is a lot of fun and we hope to see you there!

Because of the Iowa Revised Nonprofit Corporation Act, our structure of officers and Board of Directors has changed. We are looking for interested members to join our leadership!

If you are interested in being on the IACPR Board of Directors or on a Committee, please let us know. We need to know by May 5 if you have interest in the Board. The current Board will be meeting on May 11 to put a ballot together, we will mail the ballots to you by May 19, and you must return them to us postmarked by June 9. All mailed in ballots will need to be signed or they cannot be counted. We need to have the new leadership in place by July 1. As this is the first year for the restructured board, you can choose if you want a 1, 2, or 3 year term.

Please contact us if you have an interest in joining the IACPR Leadership. We will post the results on the website as soon as they are available.

TIME FOR YOU TO TAKE ACTION!

CONTACT YOUR SENATORS AND REPRESENTATIVES!

HELP GET LEGISLATION PASSED FOR CARDIAC AND PULMONARY REHABILITATION! 

Day on the Hill 2006 was a successful first step toward a legislative fix for cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation. More than 100 members of AACVPR had over 200 meetings with Senators and House of Representative members to ask for support of two identical bills that have been introduced: S. 1440 to the Senate and HR 4824 to the House of Representatives.

Now we need you. All members of the Senate and the House of Representatives need to be asked to co-sponsor this legislation. Please help make this grass roots campaign effective by contacting your Senators and the House of Representatives in your district.

NEW LEGISLATIVE AND REGULATORY ISSUES PAGE ON AACVPR WEB SITE! 
There is a new resource on the AACVPR web site home page with all the information you need to participate in this push to Congress to pass legislation mandating the coverage of cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation. It will take you through step by step on how to identify and contact your representatives, a sample letter, disease statistics relevant to your state and/or district, background information to bring you up to date on the issues, and links to follow the progress of this campaign for co-sponsorship of both bills. To access this page, please click here. 

Your Affiliate Reimbursement Contact Person (RCP) in your state or region is familiar and ready to help with this country-wide effort. Please work closely with your RCP so that it is a unified and consistent message that is sent to our legislators.

Please do not include patients at this time. AACVPR will provide further instruction if that strategy becomes necessary. If we all do our part, we can make a difference as professionals who care about our patients.

The Wisconsin Society for Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation will have their Annual Conference on April 28-29 in LaCrosse.