"My challenge that I discuss in that column is to Congress to look at their female constituents, look at what the breast advocacy community is saying, and look at how important these services are and reverse the reductions," said Silva.

The office-based payment rates for breast cancer treatment and diagnosis were very low in 2013, and the 2014 cuts are making the situation worse, according to Silva. He believes Congress should reverse the 2014 CMS-imposed reductions and fix payment at the 2013 rates for breast cancer services.

Silva said a cap on the percentage decrease to any particular code in a given year is needed in order for practices to create budgets, plan capital expenditures and determine staffing.

The practice expense methodology that CMS uses includes data points that determine the final technical component payments. When some of those data points were applied to radiology recently, they were reduced, which caused many flaws, especially to the practice expense per hour. Silva explained that Congress should restore the practice expense per hour to a statistically acceptable value.

Silva wonders whether the breast advocacy community will accept these payment reductions that will result in decreased access to breast cancer care, or fight to protect diagnostic and treatment services for such a prevalent disease.

"I'm hopeful that the breast advocacy community will be very mindful and very watchful for decreases in access to care because at that point when we see centers closing and we see patients struggling to receive these services, I think that is the point where the breast advocacy community would take action," said Silva.

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