News from the AOA's Blog

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is calling for better care coordination in VA medical centers to help prevent visual impairment in veterans with eye disease.

A March 25 VA information letter on Visual Impairment Prevention For Veteran Patients recommends that primary care physicians, optometrists, ophthalmologists and sub-specialty providers in the VA centers institute formal care coordination agreements to ensure that at-risk patients are appropriately referred for preventive eye care or specialty eye care services. Read the rest of this entry ?

Medicare is implementing an aggressive new nationwide auditing program to crackdown on inaccurate billing.

Under the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Recovery Audit Contractor (RAC) program, independent auditing firms (see below) – with their compensation based on the dollar amount of inaccurate billing they uncover – will now be retained in all 50 states to review Medicare claims filed by physicians and all other entities or practitioners who bill the Medicare program. Read the rest of this entry ?

AOA Vice President Dori Carlson, O.D., of North Dakota presents U.S. Rep. Earl Pomeroy (D-N.D.) with his AOA Health Care Leadership Award in Grand Forks.

During the one-on-one meeting, Dr. Carlson thanked Rep. Pomeroy for his support of efforts to re-introduce ODs into the National Health Service Corps (H.R. 1884) and discussed optometry’s post-health reform priorities.

Now that the health care reform bill has been signed into law, the American Board of Optometry (ABO) applauds the efforts of those in the profession who have worked diligently to include measures that assure patient access to optometric care. Optometrists should be aware that the final bill includes language related to board certification and Maintenance of Certification (MOC) that will impact the profession. The bill’s language has further validated the process that the ABO launched last month. Read the rest of this entry ?

Calling for moderate, bipartisan efforts on job growth, better education and improved access to health care, Minnesota Optometric Association (MOA) Executive Director Jim Meffert will be challenging freshman incumbent Republican Rep. Erik Paulsen in Minnesota’s 3rd Congressional District this fall.

Running in an upper middle class district west of Minneapolis, Meffert strongly emphasizes his extensive activism on education issues as well as his experience as the full-time chief executive of the MOA. Read the rest of this entry ?