Medicare Program; Announcement of the Advisory Panel on Hospital Outpatient Payment (the Panel) Meeting on August 22-23, 2016 and Announcement of Transition to One Meeting of the Panel Per Year

This notice announces the summer meeting of the Advisory Panel on Hospital Outpatient Payment (the Panel) for 2016. It also announces that the Panel will begin meeting once a year in the summer, beginning in Calendar Year 2017. Currently, the Panel convenes twice yearly. The purpose of the Panel is to advise the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) (the Secretary) and the Administrator of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) (the Administrator) on the clinical integrity of the Ambulatory Payment Classification (APC) groups and their associated weights and hospital outpatient therapeutic services supervision issues.