TAG:
laboratory tests
UnitedHealthcare Warns Labs Not to Waive Patient Fees
CEO SUMMARY: UnitedHealthcare directly tackled the issue of out-of-network labs waiving or capping copayments, coinsurance and deductibles that are to be paid by patients. In a network bulletin this month, UHC said that such arrangements may violate federal law and could lead to state ins…
Payers Using Two Approaches To Price Molecular, Genetic Tests
PRIVATE PAYERS AND MEDICARE contractors are taking divergent approaches to establishing coverage policies and setting prices for molecular and genetic tests. That’s what Kuo Bianchini Tong, MS, CEO of Quorum Consulting Inc., sees happening. “One approach seeks to recognize the c…
Phlebotomy Contributes To Drop in Sepsis Mortality
CEO SUMMARY: When Intermountain Healthcare began a quality improvement program to address sepsis, its sepsis mortality rate was 20.2%, among the lowest in the nation. By 2007, all 15 of its hospitals had deployed this program. A breakthrough came in recent years, when a phlebotomist was a…
Florida AG Opposes Bill Over Customary Charges
CEO SUMMARY: It was a surprise to the Florida Attorney General that a bill had surfaced in the Florida Legislature to amend the existing state law’s definition of usual and customary pricing to the Medicaid program. The bill would even make that change in definition retroactive. If this…
Florida Legislators to Hold Hearing on Bill About Payer Use of Decision Support for Lab Orders
CEO SUMMARY: Physicians in Florida and their state medical associations continue to battle UnitedHealth over its laboratory benefit management program that uses the lab test ordering system by BeaconLBS, a business unit of LabCorp. The latest round in this fight is language in a Florida S…
NY Times Asks: ‘Is Lab Testing the Wild West?’
HOW MANY OF YOU SAW THE NEWS STORY PUBLISHED LAST MONTH by The Wall Street Journal with the headline, “Is Lab Testing the ‘Wild West’ of Medicine?” It is the latest in a series of news stories about issues and questions involving the accuracy and quality of clinical laboratory tests …
Direct Access Test Laboratories Targeted by NY State Attorney General
CEO SUMMARY: Following an investigation of two lab companies providing direct access testing in New York State, the New York Attorney General entered into agreements with each lab company. Direct Laboratories, LLC, of Mandeville, Louisiana, agreed to cease offering DAT services in New Yor…
Doctors’ resistance to BeaconLBS comes to Florida legislature
CEO SUMMARY: THE DARK REPORT IS THE ONLY LAB INDUSTRY NEWS SOURCE to report on this important development. A hearing took place recently on a healthcare bill in the Florida senate. Physicians in Florida are working to get language inserted into a state law that would restrict the …
2015’s Top 10 Lab Stories Show Significant Changes
CEO SUMMARY: During 2015, two stories captured the full attention of most pathologists and clinical lab managers. One was how CMS intends to gather lab price market data as mandated by PAMA. The other was the continued efforts by the FDA to move ahead on proposed guidance for regulation o…
Letter from Congress to CMS Asks for Delay in PAMA Reporting
CLINICAL LABORATORY ASSOCIATIONS are using a letter-writing campaign to members of Congress as a last-minute Hail Mary attempt to head off the controversial lab price market reporting rule that CMS intends to implement after January 1. Both Democrats and Republicans in the U.S. House of Representati…
CURRENT ISSUE
Volume XXXII, No. 6 – April 21, 2025
Now that a federal judge has vacated the FDA’s LDT rule, The Dark Report analyzes the judgement and notes the various steps the FDA could take in response. Also, lab testing at pharmacies is proving to be less successful than was once anticipated.
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