Hours before the House GOP voted 229-195 in favor of repealing the health reform law, the White House sent out an email plugging key pieces of the law that are viewed as appealing to the Middle Class and urged recipients to sign into a White House website to become part of a network for future ACA messaging.

An updated bipartisan Senate drug compounding bill introduced Wednesday (May 15) further clarifies key terms like pooling and repackaging, and includes a delayed effective date requested by FDA during a recent hearing, but does not include several other changes pushed separately by the agency, consumer advocates and compounding pharmacists.

The Senate on Wednesday (May 15) voted 91 to 7 to confirm Marilyn Tavenner as CMS administrator with key Republicans voting in her favor despite their ongoing battle with HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius over her reported request for donations from the insurance industry to help with health exchange outreach.

Democrats floated four amendments, including one that would bring the House drug traceability bill more in line with the Senate's plan for an electronic interoperable unit-level tracing system, although they were unsuccessful in forging changes before the bill passed out of the House Energy and Commerce Committee Wednesday (May 15).

A bipartisan duo of lawmakers on the House Energy and Commerce Committee's health panel has asked the National Institutes of Health to weigh in on medical issues related to last year's fungal meningitis outbreak, including the agency's role in finding treatments.

Key Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee Monday (May 13) probed the circumstances surrounding the recent resignation of Leona Brenner-Gati, FDA's former acting deputy commissioner for medical products and tobacco, questioning whether she was actively working in recent months.

Witnesses emphasized to Senate Finance members on Tuesday (May 14) that Congress should entirely do away with fee-for-service Medicare for physician reimbursement after the committee sent a letter to providers stating that some physicians may always need fee-for-service.

A bipartisan coalition of senators is urging CMS to exercise more oversight of preferred pharmacy networks after the agency acknowledged concerns in its recently released 2014 Medicare Part D Call Letter that plans may be setting up such networks in ways that increase Medicare's drug costs.

Industry and congressional sources expressed doubt about whether Congress would act this year to develop a new limited population expedited development pathway despite recent interest from senators, although lawmakers are eying other antibiotic development incentives that could be included in drug compounding or drug distribution security legislation advancing through Congress.

In another government report on overpayments for erythropoiesis-stimulating agent (ESA), the HHS Office of Inspector General found the average per-treatment use of certain anemia-fighting drugs was 22 percent less than the quantity assumed in Medicare rates, and Medicare and seniors would have saved $529 million in 2011 had the ESRD base rate been adjusted to reflect a drop in anemia management drugs.

The Senate Finance Committee will hold a hearing Tuesday on physician payment reform and wrote to providers Friday (May 10) seeking advice on how to reform the current Medicare fee-for-service system in the near term, encourage physicians to move toward alternative pay models and stem overutilization, while punting to the House on SGR-related quality initiatives.

FDA's top drug official told lawmakers Thursday (May 9) that firms falling under a proposed new category of compounding manufacturing should maintain a state pharmacy license to keep drug manufacturers from edging into this new class, as stakeholders further debated how to draw jurisdictional lines between compounding and manufacturing.

Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (KY) and House Speaker John Boehner (OH) are refusing to recommend any appointments to the health reform law's controversial Independent Payment Advisory Board, as the lawmakers say in a Thursday letter to the president they “hope this board never becomes a reality” because it will lead to denied care for seniors.

The Partnership for Quality Home Healthcare applauds the Senate Finance Committee for exploring program integrity initiatives that the home health community has long pushed -- including requiring home health agencies to establish compliance and ethics programs, and temporarily limiting new providers in areas of economic growth.

Pioneer and generic animal drug user fee legislation easily cleared the House Energy and Commerce Committee's health panel Wednesday (May 8) as lawmakers instead focused on debating separate drug traceability legislation, which was marked up in the same session.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee's health panel passed a drug distribution security bill by voice vote Wednesday (May 8) -- but not before panel Democrats made clear they will seek changes on wholesale distributor licensing, pre-emption of state pedigree laws and the deadline for moving toward a unit-level system as the measure advances through the legislative process.

Georgia this week became the first state to pass a law preventing doctors from being sued for negligent care over payment guidelines in the health reform law, and the American Medical Association, which helped draft the bill, is urging other states to follow suit.

Physician groups urged House lawmakers Tuesday to give doctors five years to develop quality metrics before basing their Medicare pay on those measures, and said that if Congress wants a faster transition, providers should be paid to help develop quality-of-care measures before their reimbursement is tied to performance determined by those metrics.

A bipartisan duo of House lawmakers is pushing legislation that would mitigate the amount of people who churn on and off of public health care programs, addressing an issue that has gained attention from congressional Medicaid payment advisors and non-profit Medicaid plans.

Senate health committee Chair Tom Harkin (D-IA) lifted his hold on Senate confirmation of Marilyn Tavenner as CMS administrator, while continuing to blast the White House for not reversing course on cuts to the ACA's Prevention and Public Health Fund.