Over 150 Stakeholders Send Letter to DEA
The Alliance for Connected Care led a letter, signed by more than 150 organizations, to the Attorney General Pam Bondi requesting her leadership in maintaining the access to telehealth that President Trump initiated during his first term.
More than 150 organizations have signed this letter, including business groups like the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council and Consumer Technology Association, pharmacy experts like the American Pharmacists Association and American Association of Psychiatric Pharmacists, mental health organizations like the National Council for Mental Wellbeing and Inseparable, health systems like Johns Hopkins and the University of Mississippi Medical Center, and aging organizations like the National Alliance for Care at Home and LeadingAge.
Read the full letter here or below:
Loading...
Reload document 
Open in new tab Alliance Submits Statement for the Ways and Means Health Subcommittee Hearing on Modernizing American Health Care
The Alliance for Connected Care submitted a statement for the record for the House Ways and Means, Subcommittee on Health hearing, “Modernizing American Health Care: Creating Healthy Options and Better Incentives” on February 11, 2025.
“Telehealth has supported greater access to care nationwide, including for the more than 30 million Americans in Medicare and many of the 33 million Americans with High-Deductible Health Plans and Health Savings Accounts….
“While we deeply appreciate Congressional action to extend Medicare telehealth provisions through March 31, 2025, this was unfortunately only part of the extension needed to preserve full access to telehealth services. It is imperative that Congress act quickly to restore telehealth access lost in December and avert a loss of access to Medicare telehealth in March. Telehealth is a bipartisan policy, as demonstrated by the broadly supported 2022 legislation which extended telehealth flexibilities through 2024. While our priority is legislation that would establish permanent telehealth policies, we recognize achieving this goal could be a multi-year process. As such, we request your leadership in ensuring Americans are able to access the same telehealth that they were able to utilize in 2024 in the future. We urge you to act in in March to create permanent or long-term access to telehealth.”
Read the letter here or below.
Loading...
Alliance Statement – DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION (DEA) RELEASES SPECIAL REGISTRATION PROPOSAL
ALLIANCE STATEMENT
DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION (DEA) RELEASES SPECIAL REGISTRATION PROPOSAL
JANUARY 2025
The Alliance for Connected Care appreciates the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) forward movement on telemedicine prescribing of controlled substances policy. Today, the DEA released a notice of proposed rulemaking, which would establish a special registration framework and authorize three types of special registrations for telemedicine.
We are pleased to see the DEA propose a special registration, as required by statute, to allow comprehensive medical care through telemedicine, including Schedule II medications. These treatments are important in providing mental health, end-of-life care, substance use treatment, and many other services. Telemedicine has proven to be an effective tool in bridging the gap between patients and providers, reducing barriers to care, and supporting those most in need.
However, the Alliance is very concerned to see language in the proposed rulemaking mandating what portion of patient care can be offered through telemedicine, as this is not an appropriate guardrail for a telehealth service. Similarly, restricting the geography in which telemedicine can be offered undermines the value of creating virtual access for those patients who need it most. Restricting access to telemedicine will lead to harsh consequences for many Americans relying on telehealth for mental health, substance use disorder, sleep disorders, terminal illness, and many other medical issues.
The Alliance looks forward to working with the Trump Administration and Congress to ensure continued access to comprehensive medical care through telehealth, including when a controlled substance is required. This work is necessary to fully execute on the goals of President Trump’s Executive Order on Saving Lives Through Increased Support For Mental- and Behavioral-Health Needs, which included a national call to action to increase access to telehealth.
For more on the Alliance’s work to advance access to comprehensive telehealth care, please visit https://connectwithcare.org/dea-prescribing-of-controlled-substances/
Alliance Coleads 300 Stakeholder Letter to Congressional Leaders
The Alliance for Connected Care co-led a letter, signed by almost 300 stakeholders, to Congressional leaders emphasizing the importance of preventing patient care disruptions by extending current telehealth flexibilities in an end-of-year package for a full year or more.
Read the full letter here or below:
Loading...
DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION (DEA) RELEASES THIRD EXTENSION, ENSURING CERTAINTY AND ACCESS TO PATIENTS
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MEDIA CONTACT
Chris Adamec; cadamec@connectwithcare.org
DRUG ENFORCEMENT ADMINISTRATION (DEA) RELEASES THIRD EXTENSION, ENSURING CERTAINTY AND ACCESS TO PATIENTS
November 15, 2024
WASHINGTON DC – The Alliance for Connected Care applauds the third temporary extension of controlled substance prescribing via telemedicine rulemaking by the DEA. This one-year extension is an important step to ensure predictable access for patients, as requested by the Alliance for Connected Care and more than 300 other organizations earlier this year.
“We are pleased to see the DEA act to ensure patient care is not interrupted next month,” said Chris Adamec, executive director of the Alliance for Connected Care. “We look forward to working with the Trump Administration next year to finish the work they started in 2020 through a permanent rulemaking that creates access to comprehensive medical care, including a controlled substance when necessary, through telemedicine.”
This extension continues expanded access for all Americans, including those who may experience barriers to other types of care. These include individuals in remote rural areas, who are homebound and lack transportation, who live in areas with provider shortages, and people of all kinds whose caregiving responsibilities serve as a barrier to care.
The Alliance has long pushed for expanded access to comprehensive medical care through telemedicine, including when a controlled substance is an appropriate treatment – calling for the DEA to fulfill the bipartisan congressional mandate for a telemedicine special registration process. The Alliance strongly supports the development and implementation of a permanent policy for the prescribing of controlled substances though telemedicine to ensure these individuals do not lose access – as these are fundamental, ongoing health care access challenges for which telehealth is uniquely suited to address.
The Alliance will continue to convene patients, health care practitioners, employers, and many others who are working to ensure a future in which all Americans have access to robust and comprehensive medical care remotely.
Alliance Letter to Congressional Leaders Continued Bipartisan Leadership for Access to Telehealth
The Alliance for Connected Care sent a letter to Congressional leaders requesting their continued bipartisan leadership in assuring the public that access to telehealth services will not be allowed to lapse on December 31.
Read the full letter here or below:
Loading...
Alliance and Over 150 Organizations Request CMS to Ensure Telehealth Practitioners Location Are Protected
The Alliance for Connected Care led more than 150 stakeholder organizations in a letter requesting that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to take action on preserving the benefits of telehealth by ensuring telehealth practitioners working from a home-based (or other) location do not need to report that private residence to the federal government for purposes of either enrollment or billing.
Currently, CMS proposed, in the CY 2025 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule, an extension through 2025 of regulatory flexibility for telehealth practitioners who offer a telehealth service from their home or another location to report their currently enrolled location. However, the ability to bill a currently enrolled location does not alleviate barriers for virtual-only practitioners without a physical practice location to report other than their homes.
The signers respectfully request CMS to work with stakeholders to develop an alternate method of determining location for the purposes of payment that does not require the reporting of a home address, such as through the convening of a roundtable or a similar effort, to ensure the experiences of virtual-only practitioners are considered.
Read the full letter here or below:
Loading...
Alliance Letter to HHS OIG on RPM Report
The Alliance for Connected Care sent a letter to HHS OIG regarding the report on remote patient monitoring. The Alliance highlights inaccuracies and subjective nature of the report. The Alliance requests HHS OIG to consider retracting the report, and amending it to accurately reflect the way that RPM services are required to be delivered in Medicare, as well as reducing the bias language.
Please find the letter here or below.
Loading...
Letter on House Energy & Commerce Temporary Two-Year Extension
On behalf of the Alliance for Connected Care and the many patients and clinicians we represent, the Alliance wrote to support the Committee’s leadership in working to avert a pending telehealth cliff for Medicare beneficiaries and support bipartisan passage of the Telehealth Modernization Act of 2024 (H.R.7623).
In addition to support for the legislation, the Alliance remains concerned with the challenging language on virtual platforms and the incident to language that is restricted to virtual providers.
Loading...
The Alliance Leads Almost 350 Stakeholders Urging for a Two Year Extension on DEA Telemedicine Flexibilities
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
MEDIA CONTACT
Krista Drobac; kdrobac@connectwithcare.org
Hundreds of Stakeholders Call on Federal Leaders to Ensure Patient Care is Not Interrupted by Expiring Prescribing Flexibilities
WASHINGTON, D.C. September 10, 2024 – Today, more than 300 organizations asked Congress and the White House to intervene to ensure ongoing access to virtual prescribing for patients and providers of certain controlled substances. Stakeholders anticipate that the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) will dramatically limit virtual prescribing, either through new regulations or by allowing the existing flexibilities to expire.
The letters to Senate and House leadership urge Congress to include, in the end-of-year legislative package, a two-year extension of prescribing flexibilities to allow for time to achieve a balance between patient access and diversion control. The letter to the White House urges Biden Administration leaders to ensure that the DEA preserves access to critically important health care treatment for patients by providing more time more time to work details out, specifically issuing another extension of prescribing flexibilities.
The letters also highlight that the flexibility has been essential in ensuring that patients receive timely and necessary care. Continuing these practices is vital to sustaining access to treatment and addressing the ongoing health care challenges, particularly in underserved areas.
“After 16 years of waiting for action by the DEA, more than 38,000 comments on a flawed rule, and news of a second flawed rule, the DEA has demonstrated it cannot balance health care access with diversion control. What Congress asked for was simple, establish a special registration process. We now we find ourselves out of time again, and in need of another extension to help get this right,” said Krista Drobac, founder, Alliance for Connected Care.
The Ryan Haight Online Pharmacy Consumer Protection Act of 2008 requires the DEA, in conjunction with the Secretary of HHS, to promulgate permanent rules to allow practitioners to prescribe certain controlled medications via telehealth through a special registration pathway. As of today, the agency still had not done so. In the advent of the Public Health Emergency, the DEA allowed DEA-registered practitioners to issue prescriptions for certain controlled substances to patients via telemedicine without requiring an in-person medical evaluation. These flexibilities have been a lifeline for countless individuals across the country, ensuring uninterrupted access to essential mental health care, substance use treatment, end-of-life care, and many other crucial treatments during a time when in-person visits were impossible or unsafe.
Loading...
Loading...
Loading...