Primary Care Coding Alert

Remember, noncompliant patients are PQRI people, too. Your family physician (FP) performs a measure that might qualify for the physician quality reporting initiative (PQRI): however, the patient refuses the described PQRI treatment for religious reasons. Action: Report the measure as you would have otherwise, with a modifier 2P (Performance measure exclusion modifier due to patient reasons) appended to the Category II code. "Providers will receive credit for PQRI measures whether modified or not," says Sarah Todt, RN, CPC, CEDC, associate director for QA and compliance at MRSI Inc. in Woburn, Mass. Any time your FP treats a patient with a PQRI CPTand ICD-9 code trigger, it will count toward your overall score if you report it with a P modifier. CMS created this modifier class so you can get credit for the measure even if the FP cannot perform the described treatment. Depending on the situation, you should list one [...]