Federal register
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This document establishes Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) regulations to implement specific provisions of the Veterans Omnibus Health Care Act of 1976 and the Veterans' Benefits and Services Act of 1988 concerning the confidentiality of certain medical records. These regulations protect the confidentiality of VA records pertaining to drug abuse, alcoholism or alcohol abuse, infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), and sickle cell anemia.
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This final notice announces the calendar year 1996 updates to the Medicare physician fee schedule and the Federal fiscal year 1996 volume performance standard rates of increase for expenditures for physicians' services under the Medicare Supplementary Medical Insurance (Part B) program as required by sections 1848 (d) and (f), respectively, of the Social Security Act. The fee schedule update for calendar year 1996 is 3.8 percent for surgical services, -2.3 percent for primary care services, and 0.4 percent for other nonsurgical services. While it does not affect payment for any particular service, there was a 0.8 percent increase in the update for all physicians' services for 1996. ⋯ In our July 26, 1995 proposed rule concerning revisions to payment policies under the Medicare physician fee schedule for calendar year 1996, we proposed using category-specific volume and intensity growth allowances in calculating the default Medicare Volume Performance Standard (MVPS). We received 20 comments on this proposal. Since this proposal is related to the MVPS and this notice deals with MVPS issues, we are responding to those comments in this notice instead of in the final rule for the fee schedule entitled "Medicare Program; Revisions to Payment Policies and Adjustments to the Relative Value Units Under the Physician Fee Schedule for Calendar Year 1996" published elsewhere in this Federal Register issue.
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After consideration of comments filed and the relevant issues, the Immigration and Naturalization Service (Service) has decided not to implement one of the changes previously proposed, to preclude the use of the H-1B non-immigrant classification for graduates of foreign medical schools pursuing medical residencies in the United States. However, this rule amends the Service's regulations in other respects by modifying the filing procedures for certain H nonimmigrant petitions involving multiple beneficiaries. ⋯ This rule further amends the Service's regulations by clearly differentiating between an H-3 alien trainee and an H-3 special education trainee with respect to the time limitations on admission for these types of classifications. This rule will ease the burden on the public when filing H petitions involving multiple beneficiaries and will correct a regulatory inconsistency regarding the limitations on stay for H-3 nonimmigrant aliens.
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This final rule amends the existing regulations governing the National Practitioner Data Bank for Adverse Information on Physicians and Other Health Care Practitioners (the Data Bank) authorizing the reporting and release of information concerning: Payments made for the benefit of physicians, dentists, and other health care practitioners as a result of medical malpractice actions or claims; and certain adverse actions taken regarding the licenses and clinical privileges of physicians and dentists. This final rule removes restrictions on allowed methods of payment for Data Bank fees.