The two congressmen best known to HMEs will kick off Medtrade 2007 in Orlando with a keynote speech about their effort to blunt CMS’ regulatory actions that have thrown the home medical equipment industry into disarray. Congressmen John Tanner (D-TN) and David Hobson (R-Ohio) will speak Oct. 2 at 7:30 a.m. in room W110A/B at the Orange County Convention Center.

The legislation that the pair introduced last spring would ensure that any HME provider could participate in Medicare so long as their bids are below the current allowable. It also requires a study of competitive bidding’s impact on the industry and beneficiaries in the first 10 roll-out cities and makes competitive bidding’s expansion contingent on congressional authorization.

Similar legislation by Kent Conrad (D-ND) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) is pending in the Senate.

Industry lobbyists hoped to attach these bills’ provisions to the state children’s health insurance reauthorization legislation now moving through the Congress. But the Senate steered clear of Medicare altogether in its versions of the legislation, and the House took a pass on the matter despite attaching other Medicare-related provisions, which analysts expect will earn the proposed law a presidential veto if it gets that far.