PATH News Network Daily Edition

Pushing for Stability in Medicare Payments

• College of American Pathologists

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SPEAKER_01

The CAP backs a bipartisan bill to change Medicare payments. Fabricated citations in research are on the rise. And when should test results be posted to the patient portal? These stories and more coming up next. This is Path News Network Daily Edition from the College of American Pathologists. I'm Nancy Johnson. It's Friday, May 22nd. The CAP is joining the American Medical Association in supporting the Provider Reimbursement Stability Act, a bill in Congress aimed at addressing unreasonable and unpredictable cuts in the Medicare physician fee schedule. The bill, HR 8163, has bipartisan support. Medicare physician payment has failed to keep pace with inflation or rising practice costs. That threatens the stability of medical practices of all kinds, which is why many physician groups are pushing for passage of the bill. Researchers have found that bacteria play a role in kidney stone formation regardless of the type of mineral involved. Kidney stones made of struvite have long been linked to the bacteria that causes urinary tract infections, according to NIH News in Health. Researchers at UCLA and Washington University found bacterial microbes inside kidney stones made of calcium oxalate, which had not previously been linked to bacteria. The microbes formed in groups known as biofilms, which appear to encourage minerals to form clumps that can become stones. The new discovery could help researchers find new ways to treat or prevent kidney stone formation. The use of fabricated references in biomedical papers is rising at an alarming rate, according to a new study published in The Lancet. Researchers from several academic institutions collaborated on an audit of 2.5 million papers spanning three years. In 2023, about 1 in 2,828 papers contained at least one fabricated reference. By 2025, the rate was 1 in 458 papers. In the first seven weeks of 2026, 1 in 277 papers. The fabrication rate increased by more than 12 times over the three-year period. The researchers said the rapid rise is likely due to, you guessed it, AI writing tools. And finally, Dr. Joe Saad chairs the CAP's Council on Government and Professional Affairs, which oversees the association's advocacy efforts at the federal, state, and local levels. As part of a series of interviews I conducted with council chairs about the past year and what's on the horizon, I asked Dr. Saod about recent policy battles. Here's one key issue that's been playing out in state governments, carving out time for pathology results to be explained to a patient before they're delivered to the patient portal.

SPEAKER_00

Now we know that a cancer diagnosis can be very, very traumatic to a patient, and we don't want a patient to learn of their breast cancer diagnosis through an electronic portal. We believe that it's best when a physician communicates directly and is able to be there to discuss and answer questions about their diagnosis. So we've been successful in a number of states, I think seven states till now, in passing laws that would allow a 72-hour delay between the time a result is released and the time that a patient has access.

SPEAKER_01

You'll find the full podcast at the link in the show notes. That's all for today. For more information on all of today's stories, check the show notes. And if you've got a story we should be covering, write to us at stories at CAP.org. We'll be back Monday at 5 a.m. Eastern for another episode of the Daily Edition. I'm Nancy Johnson. Have a wonderful weekend.