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The House could vote as early as Tuesday (July 29) on bipartisan, bicameral legislation that would lay the groundwork for future reforms to how Medicare pays for post-acute care, according to the House Majority Leader's calendar for this week. The bill has moved quickly since the Senate Finance and House Ways & Means committees released a draft of the measure in March.

FDA restrictions on off-label communications are detrimental to patients who commonly have to use medications off label, including pregnant women and those with rare diseases, said stakeholders weighing into a House effort to reform medical product regulations.

IRS' release of draft forms for use by employers in reporting whether they have offered minimal essential health coverage has done little to quell business stakeholders' long-standing anxiety over the implementation of the ACA's employer mandate, since further instructions and technical specifications are not expected out until late August. The Thursday (July 24) release of the draft forms did, however, quash any hopes that the administration would consider an additional delay of the mandate.

Senate appropriators are demanding CMS keep them more in the loop on announcements related to ACA-related grants and exchange enrollment figures, writing in draft report language for their fiscal year 2015 Labor-HHS spending bill that the agency should notify the committee at least one business day before ACA data and grant opportunities are released.

Republican governors sent Senate leaders Medicaid proposals that track closely with ideas state Medicaid directors are urging CMS to embrace: streamline and move away from waiver requirements; treat states as full partners in the rulemaking process; and make pricing transparent.

An official with tax preparer company Jackson Hewitt says millions of consumers getting subsidized exchange plans this year could have their tax refunds delayed next year if the marketplaces do not send necessary documentation to those consumers by Jan. 31. The IRS late Thursday (July 24) released several draft versions of ACA-related tax forms, touching on the individual mandate, employer reporting requirements, reconciliation of premium tax credit amounts and claiming exemptions from the individual mandate.

House Ways & Means health subcommittee Chair Kevin Brady (R-TX) said he plans to introduce this year legislation to fight Medicare fraud and replace Medicare’s controversial “two-midnights” inpatient admission criteria. However, he doesn’t know whether his short hospital-stay legislation will be ready before the enforcement moratorium on the two-midnights policy runs out next March.

“We’re really close on the fraud bill,” he told reporters following a hearing on Medicare Advantage pay cuts.

A bipartisan duo of Ways & Means lawmakers is pushing legislation that would let Medicare Advantage plans charge chronically ill patients lower copays for drugs and services that work well. Senate Finance Chair Ron Wyden (D-OR) also has endorsed the idea of targeting the chronically ill with so-called value-based insurance design.

The National Association of Chain Drug Stores is using a recent Senate Finance Committee push to improve chronic care to further pharmacists' call for provider status, as NACDS says provider status would allow pharmacists to do more for chronically ill patients at the pharmacy, saving money and increasing the health of the chronically ill in the long run.