60-Day FedRegNotice (11-15-21)

Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 217 / Monday, November 15, 2021 / Notices
effective while maintaining quality
standards? Do health plans have a
process to handle routine requests from
members or to refer providers for
exemptions to benefit limits when
members seek out of network care or a
lower tier provider?
2. Do health plans allow for appeals
by providers or members to request
exemptions from benefit limits related
to out of network care or care by a lower
tier provider? Is external review allowed
for such appeals?
3. What are health plan practices
regarding internal, regulatory, and/or
accreditation standards for appointment
wait times, including variance by
specialty or type of service? How does
the health plan use travel distance or
time and/or provider-to-population
ratios in deciding which geographic
areas to consider as primary or
secondary service areas? How do health
plans use financial modeling/impact to
inform established access standards?
4. What virtual health services (e.g.,
telehealth and telephonic) do health
systems provide? Are virtual health
services used to ensure compliance with
established access standards?
5. Are clinicians within the health
system given guidelines or rules on
when to refer patients to out-of-system
providers? For example, are clinicians
encouraged to refer out of system if insystem wait times are longer than
standard, travel time or distance to an
in-system provider is too long, the
patient’s ability to travel is
compromised, or the frequency of
treatment makes travel to an in-network
provider difficult?
6. What are veterans’ experiences
with and feedback on the VA access
standards established in 2019?
Signing Authority

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Denis McDonough, Secretary of
Veterans Affairs, approved this
document on October 29, 2021, and
authorized the undersigned to sign and
submit the document to the Office of the
Federal Register for publication
electronically as an official document of
the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Consuela Benjamin,
Regulations Development Coordinator, Office
of Regulation Policy & Management, Office
of General Counsel, Department of Veterans
Affairs.
[FR Doc. 2021–24571 Filed 11–12–21; 8:45 am]
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DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS
AFFAIRS
[OMB Control No. 2900–0674]

Agency Information Collection
Activity: Notice of Disagreement:
Appeal to the Board of Veterans’
Appeals
Board of Veterans’ Appeals,
Department of Veterans Affairs.
ACTION: Notice.
AGENCY:

The Board of Veterans’
Appeals (BVA), Department of Veterans
Affairs (VA), is announcing an
opportunity for public comment on the
proposed collection of certain
information by the agency. Under the
Paperwork Reduction Act (PRA) of
1995, Federal agencies are required to
publish notice in the Federal Register
concerning each proposed collection of
information, including each proposed
extension of a currently approved
collection, and allow 60 days for public
comment in response to the notice.
Written comments and
recommendations on the proposed
collection of information should be
received on or before January 14, 2022.
ADDRESSES: Submit written comments
on the collection of information through
Federal Docket Management System
(FDMS) at www.Regulations.gov or to
Sue Hamlin, BVA (01C2), Department of
Veterans Affairs, 810 Vermont Avenue
NW, Washington, DC 20420 or email to
[email protected]. Please refer to
‘‘OMB Control No. 2900–0674’’ in any
correspondence. During the comment
period, comments may be viewed online
through FDMS.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
Maribel Aponte, Office of Enterprise
and Integration, Data Governance
Analytics (008), 1717 H Street NW,
Washington, DC 20006, (202) 266–4688
or email [email protected]. Please
refer to ‘‘OMB Control No. 2900–0674’’
in any correspondence.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Under the
PRA of 1995, Federal agencies must
obtain approval from the Office of
Management and Budget (OMB) for each
collection of information they conduct
or sponsor. This request for comment is
being made pursuant to Section
3506(c)(2)(A) of the PRA.
With respect to the following
collection of information, BVA invites
comments on: (1) Whether the proposed
collection of information is necessary
for the proper performance of BVA’s
functions, including whether the
information will have practical utility;
(2) the accuracy of BVA’s estimate of the
burden of the proposed collection of
SUMMARY:

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information; (3) ways to enhance the
quality, utility, and clarity of the
information to be collected; and (4)
ways to minimize the burden of the
collection of information on
respondents, including through the use
of automated collection techniques or
the use of other forms of information
technology.
Authority: Public Law 115–55; 38
U.S.C. 5104B, 5108, 5701, 5901, 7103,
7104, 7105, 7107.
Title: Notice of Disagreement (NOD)/
Appeal to the Board of Veterans’
Appeals, VA Form 10182 and VA Form
9.
OMB Control Number: 2900–0674.
Type of Review: Revision of a
currently approved collection.
Abstract: Appellate review of the
denial of VA benefits may only be
initiated by the filing of a Notice of
Disagreement with the Board. 38 U.S.C.
7105(a). VA Form 10182 Decision
Review Request: Board Appeal (Notice
of Disagreement) is required to initiate
Board review of an appeal in the
modernized review system as
implemented by the Veterans Appeals
Improvement and Modernization Act of
2017 (AMA). The VA Form 9 Appeal to
Board of Veterans’ Appeals may be used
to complete a legacy appeal to the
Board. The completed form becomes the
‘‘substantive appeal’’ (or ‘‘formal
appeal’’), which is required by the preAMA version of 38 U.S.C. 7105(a) and
(d)(3) to complete an appeal to the
Board. Additionally, the proposed
information collections allow for
withdrawal of services by a
representative, requests for changes in
hearing dates and methods under 38
U.S.C. 7107, and motions for
reconsideration pursuant to 38 U.S.C.
7103(a).
The Board is requesting to revise the
currently approved OMB Control No.
2900–0674 to include an updated VA
Form 10182 Notice of Disagreement.
Proposed revisions to the VA Form
10182 Notice of Disagreement include:
(1) Removal of the requirement to
provide a social security number; (2)
inclusion of checkboxes to indicate a
preferred method of hearing; (3)
inclusion of a checkbox to indicate
whether the decision for which appeal
is being sought was issued by the
Veterans Health Administration (VHA);
(4) inclusion of a checkbox to request an
extension of the deadline to file a Notice
of Disagreement; (5) removal of the
checkbox used to indicate whether the
Notice of Disagreement has been filed in
response to a Statement of the Case or
Supplemental Statement of the Case
issued under the legacy appeals process;
(6) replacement of the checkbox for

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Federal Register / Vol. 86, No. 217 / Monday, November 15, 2021 / Notices

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indicating the claimant ‘‘is homeless’’ to
indicate whether the claimant is
‘‘experiencing homelessness’’; (7) a
clarified description of the window of
time within which to submit evidence
on the Evidence Submission docket; and
(8) adding a subpart to Part III for issues
the appellant wishes to include in the
VA Form 10182 that need to be listed
on additional sheets. Proposed revisions
also include updated instructions for
completing the Notice of Disagreement.
There is a decrease in the respondent
burden because the associated control

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number originally included the
nonstandard legacy Notice of
Disagreement. Consistent with the
wind-down of legacy appeals following
implementation of the AMA, the Board
is not seeking renewal of the
nonstandard legacy Notice of
Disagreement under this control
number.
Affected Public: Individuals and
households.
Estimated Annual Burden: 64,805
hours.

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Estimated Average Burden per
Respondent: 37 minutes.
Frequency of Response: Once.
Estimated Number of Respondents:
126,000.
By direction of the Secretary.
Maribel Aponte,
VA PRA Clearance Officer, Office of
Enterprise and Integration/Data Governance
Analytics, Department of Veterans Affairs.
[FR Doc. 2021–24879 Filed 11–12–21; 8:45 am]
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