Physician Payment Sunshine: Senate Aging Committee Hearing Moved to Thursday December 15th at 2:30pm

Originally scheduled for December 7^th Senate Special Committee on Aging Chairman Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) will convene a hearing on December 15^th entitled, “Parting the Clouds: Implementing the Physician Payments Sunshine Act.”  Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, will also be in attendance. 

Kohl and Grassley developed the Physician Payments Sunshine Act, passed as Section 6002 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), which requires public disclosure of the financial relationships between physicians and the pharmaceutical, medical device and biologics industries. The law required the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to establish reporting procedures for applicable manufacturers to submit information, as well as procedures for making that information available to the public, by October 1, 2011.  

The hearing will examine the need for the timely release of regulations, the impacts of the delay on industry and health care consumers, and future steps for implementing the law. 

WHAT: Senate Special Committee on Aging Hearing – Parting the Clouds:     Implementing the Physician Payments Sunshine Act 

WHEN:          Thursday, December 15, 2:30 p.m.

WHERE:        Room T.B.D. 

Speakers:             

• Dr. Peter Budetti, Deputy Administrator and Director, Center for Program Integrity, Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Washington, D.C. 
• Allan Coukell, Director, Medical Programs, Pew Charitable Trusts, Washington, D.C. 
• David Fisher, Executive Director, Medical Imaging & Technology Alliance, Arlington, VA 

The hearing will be webcast from the committee webpage:  www.aging.senate.gov.  This will be the first forum as to the status of the regulations which were scheduled to come out on October 1, 2011.