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Senator Max Baucus (D-MT) Introduces Two Bills to Assist Pharmacy
Yesterday afternoon Montana’s senior Senator, Max Baucus introduced two important pieces of legislation in the United States Senate. You’ll be hearing a lot about both bills in the weeks ahead, and you’ll be reading summaries, bulletins, etc. Here’s one of the first summaries. This was prepared by Thomas R. Clark, Director of Policy and Advocacy at the American Society of Consultant Pharmacists. His contact information is at the end of the post. Thanks Tom, and ASCP for a good, quick summary of these two important bills.
S. 1951
Fair Medicaid Drug Payment Act of 2007
This bill was introduced August 2, 2007 by Senator Max Baucus, along with seven other Senators. It is designed to change the AMP formula and improve reimbursement to pharmacies for dispensing generic drugs under Medicaid. Provisions include:
- Remove mail order transactions and certain other discounts, rebates, and price concessions from calculation of AMP
- Base pharmacy payment on average AMP, instead of the lowest AMP
- Apply the AMP formula only when three or more alternatives are available, instead of two or more
- Raise Medicaid payment to 300% of AMP instead of 250%
- Require prior authorization for brand name drugs that are more expensive than ³other biologically and therapeutically equivalent drug products²
S. 1954
Pharmacy Access Improvement (PhAIm) Act of 2007
Introduced by Senators Baucus and Grassley on August 2, 2007, along with ten other Senators as sponsors, this bill is designed to ³ensure greater access to pharmacies for Medicare beneficiaries and strengthen Medicare drug benefit policies for America¹s pharmacists² [Baucus/Grassley press release]. The bill would:
- Require drug plans to reimburse pharmacies more quickly
- Require the establishment of information hotlines for pharmacists and physicians
- Restrict the practice of ³co-branding² of Part D prescription drug cards
- Make it easier for pharmacies that serve a disproportionate number of low income patients to join drug plan networks, including 340B pharmacies
- Require CMS to establish standards with respect to access for enrollees who are residing in long-term care facilities to a long-term care network pharmacy
- Require Part D plans to disclose their list of MAC prices prior to contracting with a network pharmacy
- Require HHS OIG to conduct a study of the cost of dispensing and submit a
report by December 1, 2008
Thomas R. Clark, RPh, MHS
Director of Policy & Advocacy
American Society of Consultant Pharmacists
TClark@ascp.com
tel:703-739-1316, ext. 123
fax:703-739-1321
1321 Duke Street, Alexandria, VA 22314 http://www.ascp.com
America's Senior Care Pharmacists®
Medicare Part D Resource:
http://www.ascp.com/MedicareRx