Northwest Regional Telehealth Resource Center

Director Nicki Perisho Urges Permanent Changes in Medicare Regulations in Senate Testimony

Washington, D.C. — November 14, 2023: Nicki Perisho, BSN, RN, Program Director of the Northwest Regional Telehealth Resource Center (NRTRC), testified Tuesday before the United States Senate Finance Subcommittee on Health Care. The hearing, titled “Ensuring Medicare Beneficiary Access: A Path to Telehealth,” explored the critical role of telehealth in providing essential healthcare services to Medicare beneficiaries.

A seasoned telehealth professional with more than a decade of experience, Perisho emphasized the significance of recent leniencies in telehealth regulations, urging the Subcommittee to making them permanent in Medicare coverage.

During her testimony, Perisho highlighted the longstanding healthcare challenges experienced by Americans in rural and frontier areas, a crisis exacerbated during the COVID-19 pandemic. She stressed the importance of eliminating geographical restrictions on telehealth visits, preserving audio-only telehealth options, expanding provider types, and ensuring payment parity for telehealth visits.

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Perisho’s advocacy for permanent changes in Medicare regulations stems from her experience managing and expanding telehealth initiatives. She illustrated telehealth’s positive impact by sharing compelling examples of reaching patients in public spaces like libraries and community centers through Telehealth Access Points (TAPs) and the ongoing need for audio-only telehealth visits in addressing healthcare disparities.

Additionally, Perisho called for the expansion of distant-site telehealth providers to include Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQCHs), Rural Health Clinics (RHC), physical and occupational therapists, and speech-language pathologists. Recognizing the impact these provider types have on rural and underserved communities.

Addressing reimbursement concerns, Perisho emphasized that telehealth services provide the same quality of care as in-person visits, urging the Subcommittee to ensure payment parity for healthcare providers conducting telehealth visits.

In closing, Perisho expressed gratitude for the Subcommittee’s dedication to improving healthcare access and called for continued support for telehealth initiatives to benefit Medicare beneficiaries nationwide.

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