Tired of shelling out hundreds of dollars a year to stay current on National Correct Coding Initiative (NCCI) edit changes? You can now access quarterly NCCI updates free on the Internet.
In the past, CMS has made the NCCI edits available as a paid subscription only. "But now," a CMS press release stresses, the edits "are available to anyone with a personal computer."
CMS lists the edits in a spreadsheet format. You can sort edits by code number or by effective date, and the Web page includes a "find" feature to make locating specific codes easier. The on-line database also provides instant access to both the "comprehensive/component" and "mutually exclusive" code pair edits.
To view the online NCCI edits, go to the Web site
http://cms.hhs.gov/physicians/cciedits/default.asp. The same Web page also includes links to documents that explain the edits, including the NCCI Policy Manual for Part B Medicare Carriers, the Medicare Carriers Manual, and an NCCI Question and Answer page.