FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: February 8, 2002

SCHUMER UNVEILS PLAN TO COMBAT WANING MAMMOGRAM AVAILABILITY IN WESTCHESTER

As area closures threaten mammogram access, Senator details plan to improve local availability, decrease wait times for breast cancer screenings, attract more doctors to field

Standing with local breast cancer survivors and doctors from the Westchester Imaging Center, US Senator Charles E. Schumer today detailed a plan to improve the low Medicare reimbursements that are forcing many Westchester County mammography facilities to turn patients away or discontinue services altogether. Breast cancer is the second most common cancer affecting women in the US, with over 200,000 new cases diagnosed each year.

Many centers are cutting back on the number of screenings they perform while others are starting to experience longer delays due to the low Medicare reimbursement rate they receive from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The average Medicare reimbursement for a screening lags far behind the actual cost of the procedure, forcing centers to pick up the extra cost. According to the American College of Radiology (ACR), the national average cost to perform a mammogram is $86.50 in a doctor's office and $124.54 in a hospital, while the current Medicare reimbursement rate is only $81.81 per screening, regardless of where it is performed.

"Thousands of women across Westchester County could be forced to wait months for mammograms because there aren't enough radiology centers that can afford to screen them," said Schumer. "The bottom line is that we need to raise reimbursement rates, which would keep mammography centers open and provide incentives to attract the next generation of radiologists."

With more women getting mammograms on a regular basis and low Medicare reimbursements forcing local mammography facilities to turn patients away or discontinue services altogether, facilities in Westchester County are, in some cases, forced to make women wait months before screening them:

• Waiting times for mammograms at White Plains Hospital Center have almost doubled over the last year, with women forced to wait four to five months for a routine screening. The hospital performed more than 9,000 mammograms in 2001, and doctors expect that number to rise substantially in 2002.

• As of December 31, 2001, Westchester Gynecologists and Obstetricians (White Plains) was forced to stop offering breast cancer screening tests altogether because the practice was losing too much money
performing the exams. According to the ACR, 40 mammography programs throughout New York State have closed since March 2001.

• In the two and a half years since the Sound Shore Medical Center of Westchester opened its Breast Center in New Rochelle, average mammograms performed per month have jumped from 90 to 220 and wait times for screening mammograms have increased from an average of one to two weeks a year ago to the current average wait of one month.

Early detection is the key to treating the disease effectively and routine mammograms reduce the risk of dying from breast cancer by 40 percent. These shortages are putting thousands of Westchester County women at risk because delayed diagnoses often result in tumors being detected at less treatable stages.

Schumer is co-sponsoring legislation with Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), the bill's primary sponsor, that would significantly raise Medicare reimbursement rates so that they more accurately reflect the cost of the procedure in New York, help struggling radiology centers remain open, and increase the number of qualified technicians who perform breast cancer screenings.

"Facilities across the state lose money every day performing these life-saving screenings," Schumer said. "If action is not taken soon to reverse this trend, it will be a devastating blow to women's health."

The widening gulf between reimbursement rates and the actual cost of the procedure has already led nearly 400 mammography programs nationwide to close since March of last year, according to the ACR. The average increase in the Medicare rate – 1.5% per year between 1997 and 2000 – has lagged far behind the medical inflation rate. Moreover, since other government insurance programs and private insurers base their reimbursement rates on Medicare, low Medicare rates create a ripple effect which lead mammography clinics to receive insufficient reimbursements from private and government insurers alike.

Finally, the low rates have also made it difficult for mammography centers to retain radiologists and technicians, and have discouraged medical students from pursuing careers in radiology.

Schumer and Harkin's legislation improves access to mammograms by:

• Increasing Medicare reimbursement rates for screening mammograms. While Medicare reimbursement rates have increased from $69 to $82 since the bill was originally drafted, new data shows that the cost of performing this procedure is significantly higher when performed in a hospital. With the closure of many stand-alone radiology clinics further increasing the burden on hospitals to provide mammography screenings, Schumer said that he will work this year to update the bill and establish reimbursement rates that more accurately reflect the cost of this procedure.

• Increasing Medicare Graduate Medical Education funding for additional radiology residency slots in an effort to get more students to pursue careers in mammography and increase funding for the Allied Health Profession program to increase the supply of radiologic technicians who perform the actual mammograms.

• Instructing the General Accounting Office to study Medicare's reimbursement rate structure for gender-specific procedures to investigate whether rates are equitable across gender lines.

"We need to push this bill through Congress and get it to the President's desk immediately because when it comes to treating breast cancer, every day counts," Schumer said.

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