The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has released its plans for the next re-compete of Round One of competitive bidding. By law, CMS must re-compete bids for competitive bidding contracts every three years, and the current Round One contracts expire on Dec. 31, 2016.
As part of its announcements, the agency detailed the product categories, competitive bidding areas (CBAs) and important dates related to the latest re-compete.
Competitive Bidding Areas
Looking at competitive bidding areas, Round One’s 2017 re-compete will cover the same nine Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs) as the last Round One re-compete, but there have been two significant changes:
- CBAs that were located in multi-state MSAs have been defined so that no CBA is included in more than one state. As a result, the number of CBAs expanded from nine CBAs in the previous Round One re-compete to 13 CBAs for the Round 1 2017 re-compete.
- CMS noted that certain ZIP codes have changed since the last Round One re-compete and CMS has updated the CBAs to reflect the changes.
The 13, essentially new CBAs are
- Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, N.C.
- Chester, Lancaster & York Counties, S.C.
- Cincinnati, Ohio
- Cleveland-Elyria, Ohio
- Covington-Florence-Newport, Ky.
- Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, Texas.
- Dearborn, Franklin, Ohio & Union Counties, Ind.
- Kansas City, Mo.
- Kansas City-Overland Park-Ottawa, Kan.
- Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach, Fla.
- Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, Fla.
- Pittsburgh, Pa.
- Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, Calif.
PDF and Excel documents detailing the geographies and ZIP codes related to each of the new CBAs is available on the CBIC website at http://bit.ly/roundone2017zips.
Categories
In terms of categories, the 2017 Round One re-compete will cover:
- Enteral Nutrients, Equipment and Supplies.
- General Home Equipment and Related Supplies and Accessories, which includes hospital beds and related accessories, group one and two support surfaces, commode chairs, patient lifts, and seat lifts.
- Nebulizers and Related Supplies.
- Negative Pressure Wound Therapy (NPWT) Pumps and Related Supplies and Accessories.
- Non-invasive Pressure Support Ventilators, but for only the following eight CBAs: Charlotte-Concord-Gastonia, NC; Chester, Lancaster & York counties, SC; Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX; Kansas City-Overland Park-Ottawa, KS; Kansas City, MO; Miami-Fort Lauderdale-West Palm Beach, FL; Orlando-Kissimmee-Sanford, FL; Riverside-San Bernardino-Ontario, CA.
- Respiratory Equipment and Related Supplies and Accessories, which includes oxygen, oxygen equipment, and supplies; continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) devices and respiratory assist devices (RADs) and related supplies and accessories.
- Standard Mobility Equipment and Related Accessories, which includes includes walkers, standard power and manual wheelchairs, scooters, and related accessories.
- Transcutaneous Electrical Nerve Stimulation (TENS) Devices and Supplies.
PDF and Excel documents containing the full list of the specific items with HCPCS codes in each product category is available on the Competitive Bidding Implementation Contractor (CBIC) website at http://bit.ly/roundone2017cats.
DATES
In terms of the 2017 Round One re-compete, CMS released a few key dates for the program:
- April 21, 2015 – CMS begins pre-bidding supplier awareness program
- Summer 2015 – CMS announces bidding schedule, and begins its bidder education program. The bidder registration period to obtain user ID and passwords also begins.
- Fall 2015 – Bidding begins
CMS reminded providers looking to participate in the 2017 re-compete that they must be licensed and accredited, and must maintain accurate information on their CMS-855S with the National Supplier Clearinghouse (NSC) and in the Provider Enrollment, Chain and Ownership System (PECOS).
More detail can be found on CMS’s main page for the 2017 re-compete at http://bit.ly/roundone2017main.