Ferrante Comments on Proposed Changes in Telehealth Services

17 August 2020 Report on Medicare Compliance

Senior Counsel T.J. Ferrante was quoted in a Report on Medicare Compliance article, “In Proposed Physician Rule, Telehealth Expands and Contracts, Limited by Statute, PHE,” about CMS’ plan to end telephone-only evaluation and management services when the COVID-19 public health emergency is over.

Ferrante said the 2021 proposed Medicare Physician Fee Schedule includes a telehealth addition that, if finalized, would allow physicians to provide direct supervision virtually, using real-time, interactive audiovisual technology. That would be a game changer for billing incident to a physician’s services, he said, because a doctor wouldn’t have to be physically present to provide direct supervision for incident-to billing or other services.

“There’s a lot of good stuff in here, but I don’t want this to give people a false sense of achievement,” he said of the package of proposed changes. “There’s work to get done.”

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