ACTION NEEDED: Sign on and Submit Comments Supporting Proposed Medicare Health Coaching Benefit

The Partnership is again leading on an effort to inform and respond to Medicare payment policies included in the CY 2027 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (PFS)!

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Please consider signing on to the Partnership letter in response to the proposed rules and/or using language from our template letter to inform your organization's comments. Comments are due by 11:59 p.m. ET on MONDAY, September 14.

BACKGROUND:

What CMS proposed. The CY 2027 Medicare PFS proposed rule (CMS-1848-P) would establish a Medicare Part B payment for health and well-being coaching under CPT codes 0591T, 0592T, and 0593T, and would recognize training received through Older Americans Act Title III-D evidence-based programs as a qualifying credential for the staff who furnish it. This is the first Medicare payment pathway built for the community-based workforce that already delivers CDSMP, DSMP, Stepping On, EnhanceFitness, and similar programs.

Why it matters. OAA Title III-D delivery has limited formula-grant funding: ACL grantees reached roughly 176,000 participants nationally between 2016 and 2022, a small fraction of Medicare beneficiaries living with multiple chronic conditions. A Medicare Part B pathway is the first mechanism that could enable program delivery scale to need rather than to the grant.

SIGN-ON REQUEST:

Time is very short! Please consider joining the Partnership to Align Community Care Co-Chairs and other organizational stakeholders on our sign-on letter outlining six key recommendations for CMS:

1. Establish general supervision as the supervision standard for the health coaching codes.
2. Confirm that fidelity-bound OAA Title III-D group workshops are billable group health coaching services under CPT 0593T.
3. Defer to ACL to define training completion and maintain the qualifying program roster.
4. Defer to ACL to issue braided funding and non-duplication guidance, concurrent with the final rule.
5. Move to permanent codes while holding the proposed valuation intact.
6. Require an explicit valuation commitment if CMS substitutes G-codes, so the change is valuation-neutral on its face.

We encourage you to:

• Sign on to the Partnership letter by 5 p.m. ET on Monday, September 14.
• Download template language covering all of these issues and incorporate as applicable into your organization's response.

Please share this request and template language with other organizations interested in opportunities to promote whole person health!

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES:

• SIGN-ON Letter responding to CMS CY2026 PFS Proposed Rule (Word version for download)
• Template language provided by the Partnership (Word version for download)
• Link to submit comments by 11:59 p.m. ET on MONDAY, September 14
• Comment Letter from Freedmen's Health Consulting
• August 2026 Partnership Webinar and Resources

Please ensure that you are authorized to approve organizational signature. If you have any questions, reach out to Autumn Campbell (acampbell@partnership2acc.org) and Jeremiah Silguero (jsilguero@partnership2acc.org).  

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