August 16, 2022

CRT Stakeholders and Friends,

Late yesterday CMS announced the opening of a 30-day comment period relating to the request for Medicare coverage of power seat elevation systems used with complex power wheelchairs.

This is good news and we have been anxiously awaiting this announcement. Now is the time for all CRT advocates to submit their comments supporting the request for coverage of power seat elevation systems during the public comment period which ends September 14. You can view the CMS announcement here.

Unfortunately, CMS also announced it is “delaying” a review of Medicare coverage for power standing systems to a later date. NCART is extremely disappointed with this decision since power standing systems were included as a connected benefit in the initial September 2020 request for coverage. We will be actively working with the ITEM Coalition and our Congressional supporters to push CMS to open the public comment period for this technology as soon as possible so that review can continue.

The ITEM Coalition has issued a press statement this afternoon that provides additional commentary and information on next steps, which can be read here.

The immediate need is to have CRT advocates submit public comments in support of Medicare coverage of power seat elevation systems by the September 14 deadline. To help with that we have two requests:

1.)  Develop and send your own comments to CMS - To assist with this, the ITEM Coalition has created a dedicated website at www.rise4access.org. The site provides access to educational information, suggested talking points, and the link to submit individual and organizational comments.

2.)  Share this update and request - Please share this information with other individuals and organizations asking them to submit their comments too.

While this is progress, we have much more work ahead. Thanks for staying involved and helping to get others to submit supportive comments to CMS. We will be sharing future updates and please contact us with any questions.