December 2024 update
The American Relief Act of 2025 was signed into law by President Biden on December 21, 2024. This legislation included a short-term extension of the current federal waivers that allow physicians to provide telehealth services to their patients. These waivers were set to expire at the end of 2024, but they will now extend until March 31, 2025. While temporarily extending these waivers is a partial victory for physiatrists and their patients, the Academy has prioritized making these flexibilities permanent and will work to ensure that Congress takes action to do so before the end of March 2025.
Please click here to learn more about the Academy’s work at the end of 2024 to keep these telehealth waivers in place.
AAPM&R will continue to advocate for expanded telehealth innovations and enhanced ways for physiatrists to advance patient care.
Telehealth has been identified as growing area of interest for PM&R physicians and an important component in all practice areas of the PM&R BOLD vision. Telehealth has quickly become a more prominent aspect of clinical practice in physiatry, particularly after the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. This changing practice environment has raised a multitude of questions and discussions about how to integrate telehealth effectively and efficiently into PM&R practices, not only in the short-term but also in the future, and what policies AAPM&R should advocate for policymakers to implement.
Background
During the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency (PHE), physiatrists relied on several key flexibilities, such as the elimination of geographic restrictions based on patient location, payment parity for telehealth services, and coverage of audio-only services when providing necessary telehealth services to patients. Employers and health plans were able to provide pre-deductible coverage of telehealth services for individuals with High-Deductible Health Plans with Health Savings Accounts (HDHP-HSA). Your Academy took an active role in advocating for Congress and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to implement these widely supported telehealth waivers early during the PHE and to keep them in place since then.
In response to advocacy efforts from the Academy and other allied organizations, a two-year extension of Medicare and commercial market telehealth flexibilities was packaged in the omnibus spending bill signed into law on December 23, 2022. This extension for telehealth flexibilities was set to lapse on December 31, 2024.
Alliance for Connected Care
To advance our advocacy strategies in telehealth, The Academy has joined more than 30 patient and provider groups as a member of the Alliance for Connected Care Advisory Board. The Alliance has several key advocacy priorities that align with AAPM&R, including expanding access to telehealth services by removing geographic and site limitations and ensuring appropriate reimbursement of providers for the delivery of telehealth.
The Alliance has made many resources available to help keep us up to date on the current federal and state telehealth regulations:
Federal Legislation Tracker
Federal Advocacy