Online Communicator - Wright & Filippis

Letter from the Prez

"Competitive Bidding" - what is it? And how will it affect our patients, our referrals and the DME profession? Congress has mandated the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to implement a program called "Competitive Bidding" for the providers of durable medical equipment. Their thought is that competitive bidding will reduce costs to the Medicare program and thus help to offset rising costs in other healthcare areas. Because this issue has been in the news, I would like to clarify what it is, how it could impact the Home Medical Equipment industry and, ultimately, our customers.

The purpose of competitive bidding is to cut costs; specifically, the amount paid to provide services for Medicare recipients. Here's how we believe it will work: Healthcare providers (such as Wright & Filippis) will submit bids to CMS, and only the lowest bidders will receive contracts to provide services exclusively in a particular geographic area. Will this ultimately reduce patient choice? Will providers still be able to provide a high level of service despite the reductions in reimbursements? Many experts believe patients will suffer as a result of fewer choices in providers – and with providers having fewer resources, patients may possibly face a reduction of quality of service they receive.

These are very real concerns. Without question, many companies in our industry will suffer because of these changes.

With this in mind, there are two important points I'd like to make. First and foremost, providing anything but the highest-quality care for our patients is NOT an option. For over 60 years, we have built the finest reputation in the home healthcare field by placing the needs of our customers first. So you can be assured that Wright & Filippis will continue to provide the very best care we can for our customers and patients – period.

Second, it is imperative that we become more efficient in everything we do. By finding new and innovative ways to reduce our costs, we at Wright & Filippis will do everything in our power to ensure that patients will continue to receive quality care long into the future.

I was nominated and elected the POAC - an advisory panel that has been established to make recommendations to CMS as to how to implement competitive bidding and not drastically affect patient care and the marketplace. We, too, will continue to monitor the impact and provide feedback that is in the best interest of our patients.

Sincerely,
AJ Filippis