AASM is the Best Resource for Board Certification Preparation
The two Board Review for Sleep Specialists courses are sold out. However, the American Academy of Sleep Medicine is offering several other education opportunities to help you prepare for the upcoming sleep medicine certification examination.
Take the Sleep Medicine Practice Exam to test your knowledge of sleep. The five-part online exam consists of 125 questions in a variety of topic areas and features instant feedback for each question, built-in reading list and printable summary guide so you can tailor your future study. Log on to the AASM Online Learning Center at www.aasmnet.org/LearningCenter/Home.aspx to register for the Sleep Medicine Practice Exam.
Check the Weekly Update next week for course and registration information for three new Webinars that are part of the Sleep Medicine Certification Examination Review Series. Topics that will be addressed include hypersomnia, sleep and neurological disease, and sleep related breathing disorders. These online programs are a convenient mean for you to participate in an interactive educational review.
National Sleep Medicine Course: Register Today for Sleep Medicine's Best Education Program
Don't miss your chance to attend the most comprehensive education program available in sleep medicine. The National Sleep Medicine Course offers participants in-depth instruction in the areas of general sleep, neurology and sleep, parasomnias, insomnia, pediatric sleep, sleep deprivation and genetics in sleep medicine from a faculty of noted and engaging experts in sleep. This five-day course has broad appeal and is designed for experienced sleep medicine clinicians as well as practitioners who are new to the field.
The National Sleep Medicine course is August 4–8, 2007, at the Westin Tabor Resort in Denver, Colo. Download the course brochure and register online at www.aasmnet.org/SleepEdEvent.aspx?id=87.
Proposed Changes to Stark Laws Affect Sleep Medicine Specialists
Published in the July 12, 2007, issue of the Federal Registry is the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) proposed revisions to the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule for 2008. Included in this announcement are proposed changes to the Stark Law that has significant implications for sleep medicine practitioners.
Specifically, CMS proposes to revise the definition of “entity” in the Stark Law regulations to include both the entity that submits the claim to Medicare for the designated health services and the entity that performs the designated health services (i.e., the under arrangements services provider).
Neil Cooper, who represents the AASM on health policy matters and is a frequent speaker at AASM courses, has prepared a detailed one-page summary of the proposed changes to the Stark Law and also includes instruction on how to submit a public comment. The memo can be downloaded from the Government and Health Policy News section of the AASM Web site at www.aasmnet.org/resources/pdf/StarkLawSummary.pdf.
Mr. Cooper will also host a Webinar to review the proposed changes, discuss the implications for sleep medicine practitioners and answer questions from participants. Specific details for the Stark Law Webinar will be in the next Weekly Update.
Encourage Your Sleep Techs to Attend Essentials Courses
Encourage your sleep technologists to attend Essentials of Sleep Technology: Hypersomnia and Essentials of Sleep Technology: Hypersomnia and the MSLT to expand their knowledge of sleep medicine and develop new skills. Registration for these Essentials of Sleep Technology courses, which will be held August 25 and 26 at the Hyatt Regency O'Hare in Chicago, Ill, is online at www.aasmnet.org/SleepEdSeries.aspx.
Internal Medicine RRC Updates Sleep Medicine FAQs
The Internal Medicine RRC has adopted a new policy for the minimum numbers of polysomnograms, multiple sleep latency and maintenance of wakefulness tests that a fellow must score and interpret during their Sleep Medicine Fellowship.
The Program Requirement states:
“Fellows must have formal instruction, clinical experience, and demonstrated competence at the completion of education in the following: the indications for and potential pitfalls and limitations of diagnostic tests and the interpretation of the results in the context of the clinical situation. These diagnostic tests must include the following:
polysomnography, scoring and interpretation of polysomnograms and recognition of artifacts, including montages with additional EEG leads for seizure detection;
multiple sleep latency testing;
maintenance of wakefulness testing”
The policy states:
To meet this requirement, a fellow must interpret at a minimum 200 polysomnograms and 25 multiple sleep latency or maintenance of wakefulness tests. At least 40 polysomnograms must be in children. A maximum of 5 multiple sleep latency tests or maintenance of wakefulness tests may be archived studies. In addition, they must score at least 25 polysomnograms, of which 5 must be in children.
The policy will be added to the list of FAQs, a resource for sleep medicine fellowship training programs, which is available on the ACGME Web site at www.acgme.org/acWebsite/RRC_140/140_sleepFAQ.pdf.
July 16 is Deadline to Make Changes to NPI before it is Public
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on May 30, 2007, announced its plans for disseminating physician and provider National Provider Identifiers (NPI) to the public though a national registry. Physicians have until July 16, 2007, to make changes to their information supplied on the NPI application before it is public. To learn more about this registry, visit the CMS Web site at www.cms.hhs.gov/NationalProvIdentStand/06a_DataDissemination.asp#TopOfPage.
Also available from CMS is a memo outlining information that will be shared though the registry: www.cms.hhs.gov/National-ProvIdentStand/Downloads/NPPES_FOIA_Data%20Elements_062007.pdf
While the American Medical Association (AMA) supports implementation of the NPI, it has concerns regarding the potential for identity theft from the posting of physician information. The AMA has prepared a memo outlining its concerns as well as steps physicians should take to ensure privacy. Download the memo from the AASM Web site at www.aasmnet.org/Resources/PDF/CMSDisseminationPlans.pdf
Physicians: New Tools Online for Medicare Quality Reporting Program
The American Medical Association (AMA) has posted tools on its Web site that physicians can use to participate in the Centers for Medicare – Medicaid Services (CMS) Physician Reporting Quality Initiative (PQRI). The reference measures can be downloaded from www.amaassn.org/ama/pub/category/17432.html.
The PQRI, which launched July 1, 2007, is a voluntary program to encourage quality of care improvement though the use of 74 performance measures on a variety of clinical conditions. Under the PQRI, physicians who report a designated set of quality measures on claims for dates of service from July 1 to December 31, 2007, may earn bonus payment of up to 1.5 percent of their total charges for Medicare physician fee schedule services. Learn more about the PQRI by visiting www.cms.hhs.gov/pqri/.
CMS Posts Decision Memo for Clinical Trial Policy
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Service (CMS) on July 10, 2007, posted its revised national coverage determination (NCD) that addresses Medicare coverage when beneficiaries participate in clinical research trials (CAG-00071R).
In this revised policy, CMS may determine that an item or service is only reasonable and necessary in a clinical trial — an option that CMS has previously defined as Coverage with Evidence Development.
The decision became effective on July 9, 2007. Details of the full coverage policy are available at the CMS coverage website at https://www.cms.hhs.gov/mcd/viewdecisionmemo.asp?id=186
David F. Dinges, PhD, Awarded NASA's Distinguished Public Service Medal
David F. Dinges, PhD, has been awarded the 2007 Distinguished Public Service Medal from the National Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA). This is the highest award the agency bestows upon non-government personnel whose distinguished accomplishments contributed substantially to the NASA mission. Dr. Dinges is Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry, Chief of the Division of Sleep and Chronobiology, and Director of the Unit for Experimental Psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
An internationally recognized expert in the biological limits of human performance relative to sleep need and circadian biology, Dr. Dinges currently serves as scientific Team Leader for the “Neurobehavioral and Psychosocial Factors Team” of the NASA-supported National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI), where he is concerned with developing preventing and countering behavioral problems that develop during prolonged human habitation in space.
The citation reads, in part, that the award is granted to those individuals whose “…contribution must be so extraordinary that other forms of recognition would be inadequate.”
Dr. Dinges is the author of more than 200 publications and during the past 30 years his research has been continuously supported by grants from Federal agencies including NIH, NASA, DOD, DOT, and the Department of Homeland Security. His laboratory, located in the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, performs a wide range of experiments involving intensive physiological and behavioral monitoring of humans undergoing performance stressors and acute or prolonged perturbations sleep and circadian neurobiology.
His scientific focus is on identifying and validating behavioral, biological and technological countermeasures that improve performance, and then transitioning these to operational settings for NASA and other agencies. He is currently directing an experiment supported by NASA and the National Space Biomedical Institute (NSBRI) on NEEMO-12 astronauts living in the Aquarius facility on the ocean floor.
A corresponding member of the International Academy of Astronautics, Dr. Dinges also currently serves as President of the World Federation of Sleep Research and Sleep Medicine Societies, and Editor in Chief of SLEEP, the leading scientific journal on sleep research and sleep medicine in the world. He has been President of the Sleep Research Society and served on the Board of Directors of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine and the National Sleep Foundation. He has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2004 Decade of Behavior Research Award from the American Psychological Association.