The Affordable Care Act (a/k/a Obamacare) affects Workers’ Compensation Medicare Set-Aside Arrangements

Due to the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), effective January 1, 2014, all restrictions on barbiturate indications will be lifted and any medically accepted indication will have coverage under the Medicare Part D Benefit. Therefore, CMS will begin allocating barbiturates for all medically accepted indications within WCMSAs (barbiturates currently are limited to the treatment of epilepsy, cancer, or a chronic mental health disorder). This change probably will increase the costs of any WCMSA in which barbiturates have been prescribed to treat the industrial injury.