Rite Aid, the nationwide drug store chain, is now allowing customers to have face-to-face virtual consultations with providers in its stores. The service is very similar to Medicare’s telehealth services, but are not covered by Medicare currently. It also seems like the next step up from in-pharmacy consultations with non-physician providers such as nurse practitioners – the model used by MinuteClinic, which operates in CVS pharmacies.
The advantage of the Rite Aid model is that physicians offering these “visits” are able to create a customer record automatically and share that with the patient’s primary care provider.
Still, the model is likely to add fuel to the longstanding advocacy efforts of groups like the American Telemedicine Association (ATA) to get CMS to loosen its telehealth coverage policies. Remember:Telehealth services are only billable to Medicare when the patients receive the service at an originating site outside a Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA). The majority of Medicare patients are seen inside MSAs.
Telehealth services are also hindered by the definition of the term “original site,” which CMS defines as any physician office, hospital, rural health clinic, skilled nursing facility, community mental health center or federally qualified health center, but not a patient’s home.
You indicate that you are billing a service via telehealth by attaching modifier GT (via interactive audio and video telecommunications system).