CMS Open Comment
In September the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) was seeking public comment for new proposed rules. This major proposed rule addresses changes to the Medicare physician fee schedule (PFS) and other Medicare Part B payment policies. These public comment periods do not happen that often. The board of the ATPPS is committed to reviewing all CMS proposed rule changes and public comments to identify areas where our members will be affected. When applicable, we look for areas to comment on CMS rulings that would be of interest to ATPPS members. With this specific ruling and comment period, we identified proposed changes that were being made to documentation strategies to provide comment. It appears that with these proposed rule changes, CMS is looking to decrease the administrative burden on physicians. Our comments specifically were addressing documentation strategies on history, exam and MDM, identified as an unnecessary administrative burden. For ATPPS members our full comment can be found under the Member Documents page. Once the final ruling is announced by CMS we will bring the relevant changes to our ATPPS members.