CMS opts for CED for beta amyloid imaging

CMS issued a proposed decision beta amyloid PET imaging improves health outcomes in Medicare patients with dementia or neurodegenerative disease. However, the agency recommended covering one scan per patient through coverage with evidence development (CED) because there is sufficient evidence that beta amyloid PET imaging could be useful to exclude Alzheimer's disease (AD) for "narrowly defined and clinically difficult differential diagnoses," and to enrich clinical trials for AD.

CMS uses CED to provide conditional coverage contingent on some form of clinical data collection in the Medicare population. Medicare does not currently cover beta amyloid PET imaging. ...