AANEM News Express

Meaningful Use Deadlines Approaching

    6/4/2014
Deadlines for Meaningful Use (MU) of electronic health records (EHRs) for 2015 incentive payments are quickly approaching. All EDX medicine physicians who are not hospital based and treat Medicare and/or Medicaid patients are required to meet MU standards of at least Stage 1 by October 1, 2014.

Clinical Interpretation and Implications of Whole-Genome Sequencing

    5/20/2014
This JAMA article raises several key concerns about the NM physician’s ability to support the costs and effort required for whole-genome sequencing.

Benson Clinical Research Fellowship

    5/7/2014
The GBS CIDP Foundation International is pleased to announce a competition for the first Benson Clinical Research Fellowship.

National Neuropathy Awareness Week

    5/7/2014
May 12-16 is National Neuropathy Awareness Week. More than 20,000,000—or 1 in 15—Americans suffer from neuropathy, and many of them do not know they have it.

AANEM Staff Join GBS CIDP for Hill Day

    5/7/2014
On May 1, Executive Director Shirlyn Adkins, JD, and Health Policy Director Millie Birr, JD, MPP, joined the GBS CIDP Foundation International on its Hill Day visits with key legislators and their staff. The group met with a total of 18 congressional offices, asking representatives to sign a letter requesting data from CMS about the 2013 NCS reimbursement cuts’ impact on patients. 

Is IVIg Therapy Warranted in Progressive Lower Motor Neuron Syndromes Without Conduction Block?

    5/6/2014
Study reports results of treatment of 31 consecutive patients with focal-onset lower motor neuron pattern limb weakness with intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIg). None of the patients had EDX signs of a generalized motor neuron disorder or evidence of conduction block.

Science News: Neurofascin IgG4 Antibodies in CIDP Associate With Disabling Tremor and Poor Response

    4/18/2014
CIDP is readily diagnosed by finding a combination of proximal and distal weakness, nerve conduction studies showing acquired demyelination, and albuminocytological dissociation. There are, however, no biomarkers that predict response to therapy reliably.

Urological Diagnoses Increased in Muscular Dystrophies

    4/9/2014
A muscular dystrophy study shows urologic dysfunction increases in more advanced stages of the disease and proposes possible associations between the frequency of urologic diagnoses and degree of inactivity, such as urine stasis, and with chronic exposure to medications such as corticosteroids.

AANEM Board Plans for the Future

    4/9/2014
“We are here to help chart the course for the AANEM and how it helps its 4500 members and the more than two million neuromuscular disease patients we, as members, care for each year,” said Francis O. Walker, MD, to the AANEM Board of Directors during its semi-annual meeting in Chicago last week.

OIG Utilizes AANEM Resources in Report on Questionable Medicare Billing in EDX Medicine

    4/9/2014
The Office of the Inspector General (OIG) released its first evaluation on electrodiagnostic (EDX) testing earlier this week. Much of its analysis was based directly upon AANEM publications. The OIG undertook this study because, “Recent investigations have found that electrodiagnostic testing is an area vulnerable to fraud, waste, and abuse.”