US Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure pitched early agency engagement with drug developers as a way to forestall possible Medicare coverage restrictions in an 18 March letter to Republican members of Congress.
She was responding to letters sent to her and Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra urging reversal of the Medicare draft national coverage determination for Alzheimer’s drugs. CMS' draft decision would provide coverage only when patients are enrolled in a randomized clinical trial