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CY2024 CPT update delivers 230 new codes, fine tunes E/M times

10/16/2023

Take a glimpse at the hundreds of CPT coding updates coming in 2024 to prepare your coding and billing staff for a successful turn of the calendar. You’ll find new codes, as well as code revisions, spread throughout the updated CPT manual, in addition to important guideline changes.

Shutdown threat, PFS patches loom for end-of-year Congress

10/16/2023

by: Roy Edroso

With the House of Representatives in flux, it looks as if the threat of a shutdown — and its potential impact on CMS operations, including distribution of medical payments — has become a live issue.

Check your Medicare telehealth compliance against HIPAA, DEA rules

10/16/2023

by: Julia Kyles, CPC

Many of the popular telehealth waivers that Medicare created during the COVID-19 public health emergency will stay in place until Dec. 31, 2024. But when you provide telehealth to Medicare patients, make sure you also follow the HHS Office for Civil Rights’ (OCR) and the Drug Enforcement Administration’s (DEA) rules that apply to all telehealth services.

Waive co-pay for indigent patients on urgent basis, but be clear it’s not forever

10/16/2023

by: Roy Edroso

Question: Our practice waived a co-pay for an insured patient in a financial hardship case last year. Our reasoning was that the patient needed care urgently and we weren’t comfortable turning them away. The patient has scheduled another visit, however, and we anticipate that the matter will be less urgent and we plan to require a co-pay before treatment. Could the patient refuse and charge patient abandonment on the grounds that we accepted their hardship earlier?

For new integrated services, community helpers do not qualify as official workers

10/16/2023

by: Julia Kyles, CPC

Question: Please provide more information about the community health integration (CHI) service in the proposed 2024 Medicare physician fee schedule... If a Medicare patient can’t drive to their doctor’s appointments, pick up their prescriptions or perform other tasks related to receiving health care, can a treating provider count the services of community helpers who perform those tasks toward CHI? In other words, can drivers and delivery people be auxiliary personnel, as described in the proposed rule?

Monitor 2024 ICD-10-CM guideline revision for COVID-19

10/16/2023

by: Savannah Schmidt

Question: Are there any ICD-10-CM 2024 code or guideline updates related to COVID-19 screening or diagnosis?

AMA consolidates COVID vaccine, admin codes; CMS approves

10/16/2023

by: Richard Scott

Make sure you’re staying accurate with an overhaul to the COVID-19 vaccine and administration codes. The AMA announced it is deleting a significant number of codes, replacing them with new codes and striking Appendix Q from the CPT Manual.

Payments lag though claims jump for 99214, as 99215 surges

10/16/2023

by: Richard Scott

Two years after the pandemic dealt a blow to the health care ecosystem, one key marker of the system’s vitality – routine office visits – had largely not recovered. The most-reported office visits, reflected in codes 99213 and 99214, sat at a depressed rate of -23% and -8%, respectively, in the four-year period from 2019 to 2022.

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