Comment Letter

Neurosurgery Urges CMS to Ban Step Therapy

  • Reimbursement and Practice Management

The Honorable Chiquita Brooks-LaSure Administrator
Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services
Department of Health and Human Services
7500 Security Boulevard
Baltimore, MD 21244-1850

Via Electronic Delivery

Re: Step Therapy for Part B Drugs in Medicare Advantage

Dear Administrator Brooks-LaSure,

The undersigned organizations, representing millions of Medicare beneficiaries with life-threatening, complex, chronic conditions and/or the physicians who care for them, are asking the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to ensure that beneficiaries enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans continue to have appropriate and timely access to the therapies they need to properly manage their conditions. We are taking this opportunity to ask again for the agency to move swiftly to reinstate the step therapy prohibition in Medicare Advantage (MA) plans for Part B drugs as described in the September 17, 2012, HPMS memo Prohibition on Imposing Mandatory Step Therapy for Access to Part B Drugs and Services.

Click here to read the full Neurosurgery Urges CMS to Ban Step Therapy.