Pulmonology Coding Alert

Find out how much CMS has raised payment for other E/M codes.The inevitable has happened -- Medicare no longer recognizes consultation codes in 2010, but don't tear out those pages altogether. You can still submit these codes to non- Medicare payers who don't follow Medicare's guidelines.Lowdown: Effective January 1, 2010, CMS has eliminated payment for "the use of all consultation codes (inpatient and office/outpatient codes for various places of service except for telehealth consultation G codes) on a budget neutral basis by increasing the work RVUs for new and established office visits" and for initial hospital and nursing facility visits, the Final Rule notes.This means eliminating Medicare fee-for-service reimbursement for all inpatient (99251-99255, Inpatient  consultation for a new or established patient ...) and outpatient (99241- 99245, Office consultation for a new or established patient ...) consultation codes. The elimination of consult codes is anticipated to hurt specialty practices in particular, says [...]