CMS' monthly open-door forum revealed announcements of mostly old news already covered in Part B News, with a few notable exceptions: there will be an open-door forum on annual wellness visits (AWVs) on March 28 and the surrogate program for PECOS revalidation is close to going live.

The next ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee Meeting is planned for Monday, March 5th. Don't miss out on any breaking news. This is the first time CMS’ ICD-10 stakeholders have faced the public since the delay and DecisionHealth Daily be there for blow by blow coverage of what is said, offering possible clues into the future of ICD-10 and what it means for people who need to keep preparing for ICD-9 changes.

EHR's Stage 2 meaningful use standards are out in fact sheet form and as a proposed rule.

Farzad Mostashari, U.S. National Coordinator for Health Information Technology, announced the proposed rule's impending release Thursday at the Healthcare Information and  Management Systems Society (HIMSS) annual conference in Las Vegas, NV. The fact sheet and proposed rule came out Thurday evening.

Your providers are safe from the impending 27.4% cut to their Medicare payments set to hit March 1 thanks to Congress passing a temporary ‘doc fix’ Friday through the end of 2012.

The vote to extend the payroll tax holiday bill and keep the current $34.0376 conversion rate through Dec. 31 comes on the heels of intense debate among Congress members as to whether preventing the pay cut was fiscally sound.  The $150 billion bill failed to include deeper cuts requested by GOP Congress members but remained largely budget neutral.

Leaks out of Capitol Hill strongly suggest there'll be a Doc Fix 2 by Friday -- this one for 10 months. As for how Congress will pay for it, well...

The 10-month, through-end-of-2012  figure is cited so far by the National Journal, The Hill, DOTmed, and others, and seems solid. To pay for it, or at least pretend to pay for it, a cluster of program and provider cuts have been mentioned by tip sheets and news services.