Cardiology Coding Alert

You'll have a little extra work to do to enroll using the new specialty code.

NGS has offered important instructions for enrolling under Medicare's new physician specialty code for interventional cardiology (C3). The new specialty code was effective Jan. 1, 2015.

"In the past, interventional cardiology was not an acceptable Medicare specialty, and you had to go with cardiology, but now you can submit an application for that specialty if the specialist is new, or you can request a change for someone who's currently enrolled as a cardiologist to make that change to interventional cardiology," said NGS Medicare's Nathan L. Kennedy, Jr., CPC, CHC, CPPM, CPC-I, during the MAC's Jan. 27 online conference, "J6 January Quarterly Release Webinar."

CMS-855I (07/11): You use Section 2.D.1 of the Medicare Enrollment Application Physicians and Nonphysician Practitioners CMS-855I (07/11) to designate physician specialties. The current form doesn't include Interventional Cardiologist as an option. To enroll an interventional cardiologist, enter a "P" for Primary or "S" for Secondary in the field for "Undefined physician type." Then enter "Interventional Cardiology" in the field for "Specify."

PECOS: If your practice wants to change a cardiologist's primary specialty to Interventional Cardiology and you use the Internet-based Provider Enrollment, Chain and Ownership System (PECOS), you'll have to submit the change request by paper because PECOS currently won't let you change a primary specialty online