Hello,
I work for a pediatric practice who employs a registered dietitian for nutrition counseling. Currently, a provider sees the patient, recommends that the patient is seen by the dietitian, and then the dietitian provides the counseling. We bill the E&M for the level of service the physician provides, and then 99401-99404 depending on how much time our dietitian spends counseling the patient. We are wondering if once we have credentialed our dietitian, we could bill an E&M for her visit without the patient seeing the physician?
According to the 2017 CPT code book, an E&M can be billed by "physicians and other qualified health care professionals who may report evaluation and management services reported by a specific CPT code(s)." The next section states "A 'physician or other qualified health care professional' is an individual who is qualified by education, training, licensure/regulation (when applicable), and facility privileging (when applicable) who performs a professional service within his or her scope of practice and independently reports that professional service."
We feel that a registered dietitian fits that description, but I just wanted to see if we are thinking about this incorrectly.
Thank you so much!
I work for a pediatric practice who employs a registered dietitian for nutrition counseling. Currently, a provider sees the patient, recommends that the patient is seen by the dietitian, and then the dietitian provides the counseling. We bill the E&M for the level of service the physician provides, and then 99401-99404 depending on how much time our dietitian spends counseling the patient. We are wondering if once we have credentialed our dietitian, we could bill an E&M for her visit without the patient seeing the physician?
According to the 2017 CPT code book, an E&M can be billed by "physicians and other qualified health care professionals who may report evaluation and management services reported by a specific CPT code(s)." The next section states "A 'physician or other qualified health care professional' is an individual who is qualified by education, training, licensure/regulation (when applicable), and facility privileging (when applicable) who performs a professional service within his or her scope of practice and independently reports that professional service."
We feel that a registered dietitian fits that description, but I just wanted to see if we are thinking about this incorrectly.
Thank you so much!