ADLM congressional briefing urges lawmakers to ensure quality pediatric testing

The Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine (ADLM) held a congressional briefing on Wednesday, February 2 that highlighted several ways that Congress can improve the quality of care provided to the United States’ 73 million children.

Danyel Tacker, PhD, DABCC, FADLM, clinical professor at West Virginia University Hospitals, highlighted the importance of newborn screening (NBS), which helps ensure that babies with rare but treatable conditions receive necessary testing. Congress can play a vital role in NBS by continuing to provide stable funding for this highly successful federal-state initiative.

Stanley F. Lo, PhD, DABCC, FADLM, pathology professor at the Medical College of Wisconsin, described the need for more accurate pediatric reference intervals (PRIs), which help physicians interpret test results and diagnose whether a child has a particular medical condition. Currently, most PRIs are based off of adult reference intervals, which can lead to misdiagnosis, inappropriate interventions, and increased healthcare costs. Congress has asked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to develop a framework for addressing this issue.

Hubert Vesper, PhD, director of Clinical Standardization Programs at the CDC, discussed how the agency can use its existing infrastructure — without creating any new programs — to develop better PRIs. More than 50 healthcare groups, including ADLM, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the Children’s Hospital Association, have endorsed providing the CDC with the funding needed to improve these intervals.

Lastly, Dennis J. Dietzen, PhD, DABCC, FADLM, Megan Dishop Chair of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Phoenix Children’s Hospital, discussed the critical role that laboratory developed tests (LDTs) play in meeting the testing needs of children. He stated that the congressionally mandated CLIA standards continue to provide the flexible, but rigorous oversight needed to serve pediatric patients.

New law will delay Medicare CLFS cuts

In January, the House of Representatives voted to pass the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026 (HR 7148). This bill, which the Senate also voted in favor of, was signed into law by President Trump on February 3 and will freeze Medicare Clinical Laboratory Fee Schedule (CLFS) cuts until January 1, 2027.

The yearlong delay comes after the scheduled implementation of the Protecting Access to Medicare Act (PAMA) rate cuts and laboratory reporting requirements had already begun on February 1. Approximately 800 laboratory services were slated to be cut by up to 15%. In addition to blocking these cuts, the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026 will delay the current PAMA reporting period from Feb.1–April 30 to May 1–July 31. Labs must now report their private payer payment data from the first 6 months of 2025, rather than from 2019. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will use this data to calculate CLFS rates for 2027.

The Congressional Budget Office forecasted that these changes will save the government $495 million over the next 10 years.

However, many medical societies, including the Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine, are still advocating for Congress to pass the Reforming and Enhancing Sustainable Updates to Laboratory Testing Services (RESULTS) Act. This bipartisan legislation would reform PAMA, addressing structural flaws in the CLFS that threaten access to essential diagnostic services.

NIH FY 2026 budget increases under new law

In February, President Trump signed into law the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026 (HR 7148), increasing the budget for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in fiscal year 2026 by just under 1%, or $415 million, to $48.7 billion.

If the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026 had not been passed, biomedical research efforts would have been threatened by a proposed 40% cut to the 2026 NIH budget that the Trump administration originally put forth last spring.

Previously, the Trump administration had canceled, frozen, and delayed thousands of NIH grants, including those supporting students and researchers from underrepresented groups.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026 grants the NIH $48.7 billion for investments in biomedical research, including Alzheimer’s disease and related dementia research, cancer research, diabetes research, and women’s health research. In particular, the funding includes $7.35 billion for the National Cancer Institute, $6.59 billion for the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, $663.2 million for the National Human Genome Research Institute, and $1.5 billion for the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health.

The new legislation also prevents cuts to indirect costs — payments the NIH makes to the institutions of grant holders to cover shared infrastructure. A year ago, the Trump administration tried to cap those costs at 15% of the total grant amount. However, that rate cap faced multiple lawsuits. In January, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit affirmed an injunction barring the rate cap, which was set by the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts in April 2025.

Read the full March-April 2026 issue of CLN.