It was a busy day for CMS today. After keeping everyone in suspense for months, CMS finally issued its decision on the Massachusetts state Medicaid program waiver request that proposed to limit access to covered outpatient drugs to Medicaid (in Massachusetts, called “MassHealth”) enrollees. As many observers predicted, CMS did not approve the state’s request. Notably, however, the CMS response letter provided a pathway for Massachusetts to achieve a substantially similar result. … More
Tag Archives: Covered Outpatient Drugs
Medicaid Program: Covered Outpatient Drugs, Final Rule with Comment Period Summary
On January 21, 2016, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) published a long-awaited final rule entitled “Medicaid Program: Covered Outpatient Drugs.” CMS actually proposed this rule in February, 2012, so it’s taken almost four years for the agency to finalize the many policies on which they sought comment – almost all of which flow from the enactment of the federal health care reform law that was enacted in 2010,… More