Also: The Affiliate Society Council met at the D.C. fly-in last month. The ASC, chaired by Chris Adams, MD, and staffed by ACR Senior Manager of State Affairs Joseph Cantrell, JD, is the ACR’s forum for state rheumatology societies to come together for updates and to share what they’re doing among themselves and the ACR. This year, U.S. states introduced over 30 bills aiming to reform pharmacy benefits manager practices, 11 bills about step therapy reform, 10 bills about non-medical switching and eight bills to streamline prior authorization. Forty states have passed biosimilars substitution laws (most requiring provider notification within five days). Note that the FDA still has not finalized a pathway for interchangeable biosimilars.
That’s all for now from D.C. Thanks for reading and sharing this.
Angus Worthing, MD, FACP, FACR, chair, Government Affairs Committee, is a practicing rheumatologist in the Washington, D.C., metro area and clinical assistant professor of medicine at Georgetown University.
