[nabs-l] Fw: [Fwd: [acb-l] FW: ALERT! Sign-On to Letter to Congressional Leadership Concerning Health Reform and Vision Loss]

[Jim Reed]

Homer Simpson's brain: "Use reverse psychology." 
 Homer: "Oh, that sounds too complicated." 
 Homer's brain: "Okay, don't use reverse psychology."
 Homer: "Okay, I will!"

--- On Wed, 5/27/09, Gerald Hutch <modrepro at mt.net> wrote:

From: Gerald Hutch <modrepro at mt.net>
Subject: [Fwd: [acb-l] FW: ALERT! Sign-On to Letter to Congressional Leadership  Concerning Health Reform and Vision Loss]
To: "Dan Burke" <burke.dall at gmail.com>
Date: Wednesday, May 27, 2009, 9:21 PM




  
  
FYI  !



Comments?



Jerry Hutch





-------- Original Message --------

  
    
      Subject: 
      [acb-l] FW: ALERT! Sign-On to Letter to Congressional
Leadership Concerning Health Reform and Vision Loss
    
    
      Date: 
      Wed, 27 May 2009 19:37:12 -0700
    
    
      From: 
      Andy Baracco <wq6r at socal.rr.com>
    
    
      To: 
      acb-l at acb.org
    
    
      CC: 
      acb-hsp at acb.org,ccb-l at googlegroups.com,blind-counselors at topica.com
    
  





From: AFB DirectConnect [mailto:blemoine at afb.net]
Sent: Wednesday, May 27, 2009 10:33 AM
To: AFB Subscriber
Subject: ALERT! Sign-On to Letter to Congressional Leadership 
Concerning Health Reform and Vision Loss




Sign-On to Letter to Congressional Leadership Concerning Health 
Reform and Vision Loss

For further information, contact--

Mark Richert
Director, Public Policy
American Foundation for the Blind
202-822-0833
mrichert at afb.net

Leadership in Congress needs to hear from the vision loss community 
immediately to ensure that policy addressing the unique health care 
needs of people who are blind or visually impaired is part of 
comprehensive health care reform legislation. You are invited to join 
in a sign-on letter to be delivered by AFB next week to the chairs 
and ranking members of the committees of the U.S. Senate and House of 
Representatives with particular responsibility for health care 
legislation. Copies of the letter will also be delivered to senior 
House and Senate leadership of both parties.

If your organization can sign on to the letter below, please forward 
the complete name of your organization (no abbreviations please) to 
Barbara LeMoine (a href="mailtoblemoine at afb.net" blemoine at afb.net) by 
noon on Wednesday, June 3.

Organizational names will be listed alphabetically at the end of the 
letter; no actual signatures are necessary. We strongly encourage all 
organizations of and for people who are blind or visually impaired to 
join in this effort, and please share this sign-on request widely 
inviting any groups beyond our field to join us as well.

The letter's text follows--

We, the undersigned organizations representing, serving, and 
advocating for the more than 20 million Americans of all ages 
experiencing significant vision loss, urge you to exercise your 
leadership to ensure that any comprehensive health reform legislation 
enacted by the 111th Congress adequately addresses the needs and 
rights of individuals living with vision loss. Specifically, we call 
upon Congress to send to President Obama legislation that, at a minimum

• ensures that individuals with vision loss and other disabilities 
can properly identify and take medications by mandating appropriate 
labeling standards and methods for providing nonvisual and enhanced 
visual access to drug container labeling and related information;

• establishes clear Medicare (or other national minimum benefit plan) 
coverage for, and fosters broader private plan availability of, low 
vision devices and other medically necessary assistive technologies; and

• allows orientation and mobility specialists, vision rehabilitation 
therapists, and low vision therapists to be full participants in the 
professional team providing specialized services to people with 
vision loss by establishing unambiguous Medicare (or other national 
minimum benefit plan) reimbursement for the services such professionals offer.

Congress is currently weighing a variety of health care policy 
options that have the potential to fundamentally transform the scope 
and delivery of health care to all Americans. While many of these 
policy options could be of significant benefit to Americans with 
vision loss, we are concerned that proper attention is not being 
given in the policy debate to several basic health care needs 
experienced by people who are blind or visually impaired. We 
therefore ask for your help to craft and enact policy solutions as 
part of health care reform to address these unmet needs.

Drug Label Information

Current Law: No state in the union clearly requires labeling of 
prescription or other medications to be accessible to individuals 
with vision loss through minimum large print font size, audible 
labeling technologies, tactile markings or braille, or other methods 
calculated to provide alternatives to visual use of medication 
labeling and related information. Moreover, current federal law 
places no meaningful requirements on such labeling to ensure 
nonvisual and enhanced visual access. Additionally, while retail 
pharmacies can be held accountable for providing some degree of 
access to label information under the Americans with Disabilities 
Act, the ADA neither provides standards for pharmacies to follow nor 
establishes a consistent national policy ensuring that customers 
will, upon request, be provided the nonvisual or enhanced visual 
means of their choice to use drug labeling safely and independently. 
The failure to make medication labeling accessible to people with 
vision loss has been shown to lead to significant health risks (see 
e.g., consumer survey conducted by the American Foundation for the 
Blind at www.afb.org/labels).

Proposed Policy: Congress should enact legislation requiring retail 
pharmacies to offer, upon the request of a customer, nonvisual or 
enhanced visual means for using medication labeling and related print 
information safely and independently. The means to accomplish label 
accessibility must be the means of the customer's choice and conform 
to national minimum standards to ensure customer privacy, consistency 
and reliability.

Low Vision Devices and Other Medically Necessary Assistive Technology

Current Law: Very few private health plans offer customers access to 
low vision devices or other assistive technologies that maximize 
remaining usable vision or otherwise provide nonvisual access to 
information and the environment. Moreover, the Centers for Medicare 
and Medicaid Services (CMS) refuse Medicare coverage of any device 
that employs one or more lenses regardless of a device's other 
technological features simply on the grounds that devices using 
lenses fall within the long-standing statutory bar on coverage for 
eye glasses. Other categories of assistive technology are routinely 
denied coverage on the grounds that they are convenience items, are 
not primarily for use in the home, or on other erroneous bases. 
People with vision loss can use low vision devices and other 
assistive technologies to manage their health care needs, properly 
identify medications, maintain proper diet, and ensure safe mobility 
at home and in community. Along with appropriate rehabilitation 
services, low vision devices and other assistive technologies prevent 
injury and the acquiring of additional disabling conditions.

Proposed Policy: Congress must overturn the CMS regulation barring 
coverage for low vision devices and establish clear criteria for 
their provision. Such criteria should acknowledge other distinctive 
features employed by the most valuable low vision devices, other than 
their mere use of a lens, such as a device's integration of a light 
source, use of electrical power, or other distinctive features. In 
addition, Congress must establish clear parameters for CMS to follow 
to provide Medicare beneficiaries with vision loss access to 
assistive technologies meeting their unique needs.

Vision Rehabilitation

Current Law: Medicare currently pays for some forms of vision 
rehabilitation services provided under the direct supervision of a 
physician and offered by an array of state licensed personnel. 
However, orientation and mobility specialists, vision rehabilitation 
therapists, and low vision therapists, professionals who are 
explicitly trained to provide such vision rehabilitation services, 
are not among the professional disciplines recognized for purposes of 
Medicare reimbursement. This means that, while the services offered 
by other professionals--such as occupational and physical 
therapists--are services provided by personnel who are regularly part 
of the team of providers offering some limited form of vision 
rehabilitation addressing, for example, a beneficiary's needs for 
daily living skills training or other related services, the 
professional team is incomplete. As a result, beneficiaries are not 
ensured access to the full range of quality services, such as 
orientation and mobility, provided by the best qualified professional 
disciplines. Moreover, since the limited vision rehabilitation-like 
services that CMS will pay for must be provided under strict 
physician supervision, these services, which are most relevant when 
offered in a beneficiary's home or in community, are diminished in 
effectiveness. Finally, a Medicare demonstration project currently 
being undertaken to assess vision rehabilitation reimbursement has 
such significant design and administrative flaws that Congress should 
not wait for its conclusions or have confidence in their validity.

Proposed Policy: Congress must establish unambiguous coverage for the 
services offered to Medicare beneficiaries by orientation and 
mobility specialists, vision rehabilitation therapists, and low 
vision therapists to allow the most qualified and complete team of 
professional service providers to meet the unique needs of 
individuals with vision loss. Such services should be allowed to be 
provided in a beneficiary's home and community to maximize their effectiveness.

Thank you for your thoughtful consideration and for your advocacy on 
behalf of Americans living with vision loss. We look forward to 
working closely with you as health reform moves forward.

Respectfully,

[organizations listed alphabetically]