[Federal Register: February 28, 2008 (Volume 73, Number 40)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Page 10715-10716]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr28fe08-28]
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SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION
20 CFR Parts 404, 405, and 416
[Docket No. SSA 2007-0053]
RIN 0960-AG54
Compassionate Allowances for Cancers; Office of the Commissioner,
Hearing
AGENCY: Social Security Administration (SSA).
ACTION: Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking; Announcement of Public
Hearing and Limited Reopening of Comment Period.
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SUMMARY: We are considering ways to quickly identify diseases and other
serious medical conditions that obviously meet the definition of
disability under the Social Security Act (the Act) and can be
identified with minimal objective medical information. We are calling
this method ``Compassionate Allowances.'' We held one public hearing
already and plan to hold additional public hearings this year. This is
the second hearing in the series. The purpose of this hearing is to
obtain your views about the advisability and possible methods of
identifying and implementing compassionate allowances for children and
adults with cancers. Our first hearing, on December 4-5, 2007, dealt
with rare diseases. We will address other kinds of medical conditions
in later hearings.
DATES: This hearing will be held April 7, 2008, between 8:45 a.m. and
5:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST), in Boston, MA. The hearing will
be held at 7 Cambridge Center, Cambridge, MA, 02142, at the Broad
Institute Auditorium of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
While the public is welcome to attend the hearing, only invited
witnesses will present testimony. You may also watch the proceedings
live via webcast beginning at 9 a.m. Eastern Standard Time (EST). You
may access the webcast link for the hearing on the Social Security
Administration Web page at http://www.socialsecurity.gov/
compassionateallowances/hearings0407.htm.
ADDRESSES: You may submit written comments about the compassionate
allowances initiative with respect to children and adults with cancers,
as well as topics covered at the hearing by: (1) Internet through the
Federal eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov; (2) e-mail
addressed to Compassionate.Allowances@ssa.gov; or (3) mail to Diane
Braunstein, Director, Office of Compassionate Allowances and Listings
Improvements, ODP, ODISP, Social Security Administration, 4468 Annex,
6401 Security Boulevard, Baltimore, MD 21235-6401. We must receive
written comments by May 9, 2008.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Compassionate.Allowances@ssa.gov. You
may also mail inquiries about this meeting to Diane Braunstein,
Director, Office of Compassionate Allowances and Listings Improvements,
ODP, ODISP, Social Security Administration, 4468 Annex, 6401 Security
Boulevard, Baltimore, MD 21235-6401. For information on eligibility or
filing for benefits, call our national toll-free number 1-800-772-1213
or TTY 1-800-325-0778, or visit our Internet site, Social Security
Online, at http://www.socialsecurity.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
Background
Under titles II and XVI of the Act, we pay benefits to individuals
who meet our rules for entitlement and have medically determinable
physical or mental impairments that are severe enough to meet the
definition of disability in the Act. The rules for determining
disability can be very complicated, but some individuals have such
serious medical conditions that their conditions obviously meet our
disability standards. To better address the needs of these individuals,
we are looking into ways to allow benefits as quickly as possible.
On July 31, 2007, we published an advance notice of proposed
rulemaking (ANPRM) in the Federal Register to
[[Page 10716]]
solicit the public's views on what standards we should use for making
compassionate allowances, methods we might use to identify
compassionate allowances and suggestions for how to implement those
standards and methods. (See 72 FR 41649.) You may read the ANPRM at
http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr/index.html or at http://
www.regulations.gov, where you may also read the public comments we
received. The 60-day comment period on the overall compassionate
allowance initiative ended on October 1, 2007. We reopened the comment
period in connection with our first public hearing in order to receive
comments with respect to children and adults with rare diseases. This
notice constitutes a limited reopening of the comment period with
respect to children and adults with cancers, as well as topics covered
at the hearing on April 7, 2008.
Will We Respond to Your Comments?
We will carefully consider your comments, although we will not
respond directly to comments sent in response to this notice or the
hearing. Thereafter, we will decide whether to implement the
compassionate allowance initiative and, if so, how the initiative will
be implemented. If we decide to issue regulations addressing
compassionate allowances, we will publish a notice of proposed
rulemaking (NPRM) in the Federal Register. In accordance with the usual
rulemaking procedures we follow, you will have a chance to comment on
the revisions we propose in the NPRM, and we will summarize and respond
to the significant comments in the preamble to any final rules.
Additional Hearings
We held a hearing on rare diseases on December 4 and 5, 2007. You
may access a transcript of the hearing at www.regulations.gov, when it
becomes available. We plan to hold additional hearings on chronic
conditions and traumatic injuries, and will announce those hearings
later with notices in the Federal Register.
(Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance Program Nos. 96.001, Social
Security--Disability Insurance; 96.006, Supplemental Security
Income. (72 FR 62608)
Dated: February 6, 2008.
Michael J. Astrue,
Commissioner of Social Security.
[FR Doc. E8-3720 Filed 2-27-08; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4191-02-P