Girlfriend, Can I Have One of Those?

I guess it’s not only seniors that sometimes face the tough choice of buying food versus medicine.

In a recent survey, it was discovered that borrowing and sharing of prescription medications is common practice among more than one-third of women of reproductive age. Women of reproductive age (18-44 years) are more likely to report this practice (36.5%) than are other aged women (19.5%). Allergy medications (43.8%) and pain medications (42.6%) were the types of drugs most commonly borrowed or shared by this group of women.

A letter to the editor from Mr. Kuhn

CMS Deputy Administrator Herb Kuhn writes in a letter to the editor, published Aug. 5 in the Baltimore Sun:

“Congress just axed a promising program to replace government-mandated pricing with competitive bidding” for DME. “Continued congressional inertia will only impose crushing obligations on our children and grandchildren and undermine our country's economic viability in a global economy.”

Just 1%

According to government figures, Medicare loses approximately $70 billion annually to fraud. Of that, approximately $700 million--less than 1 percent--is from fraudulent DME claims.