December 13, 2024 | By Rhonda Granja, B.S., CMA, CPC, RMC, CMC, CMOM, CMIS As we navigate this complex world of coding, every year we prepare for changes, updates, new codes as well as deletion of codes. For 2025, there are 420 overall updates that are in the CPT 2025 code set. Those include…
November 29, 2024 | By Terry A. Fletcher, BS, CPC, CCC, CEMC, CCS, CCS-P, CMC, CMSCS, ACS-CA, SCP-CA, QMGC, QMCRC, QMPM, PACS Telehealth 2025: The Final Rule CMS issued the calendar year (CY) 2025 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) final rule on Nov. 1, 2024, publishing guidance that will have providers and coders scratching…
Insurance Discrimination – Against the Provider Author: Jeana M. Singleton, Esq. When the concept of “insurance discrimination” rears its ugly head, we often think of it in the context of when an insurance company treats some people differently than others based on protected classes, such as race, national origin, sex, or religion. Sometimes, this type…
December 22, 2023 | By: Edward Baker, Of Counsel | Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein On September 30, 2023, the U.S. Department of Justice announced a $172 million False Claims Act (FCA) settlement with Cigna relating to the submission of invalid HCC diagnosis codes to CMS in order to increase Medicare Advantage member risk scores, and therefore,…
November 17, 2023 | By Amanda Waesch This past September 2023, the Office of Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (OIG) issued Advisory Opinion 23-06 (AO).1 The Opinion involved a proposed arrangement between an independent pathology laboratory and third-party physician laboratories for the purchase of the technical component of…
September 15, 2023 | By: Edward Baker, Of Counsel | Lieff Cabraser Heimann & Bernstein If you lie awake at night worrying about whether your coding, auditing, or compliance practices might be based on misinterpretations of federal law, opening up your healthcare employer—or yourself!—to treble damages and penalties under the False Claims Act (FCA), you may…
October 27, 2023 | By Rachel Rose, JD, MBA “Do not go gentle into that good night” is a poem by Dylan Thomas. While this poem is often connected with a dying individual, it is equally apropos to procuring technology which includes generative artificial intelligence (“AI”). As set forth in the American National Standard…
April 9, 2021 | By Amanda Waesch In December 2016, Congress passed the 21st Century Cures Act (often simply called the “Cures Act”). Woven within the Cures Act is Section 4004 titled “Information Blocking.”[1] The purpose of this section is to prohibit any action or practice that interferes with or prevents access to electronic…
A question that I get asked repeatedly, that I haven’t taken the time to address in a long time, came up on a webinar that I was doing for orthopedic executives and coders. What happens when a provider sees a patient and then later finds out that they were a resident of a Skilled Nursing…
March 10, 2023 | By Bryan Meek, Esq., Brennan, Manna, and Diamond OVERVIEW: The Eliminating Kickbacks in Recovery Act (“EKRA”), part of the Substance Use-Disorder Prevention that Promotes Opioid Recovery and Treatment (“SUPPORT”) for Patients and Communities Act, was passed in 2018. Since its passing, there has been very limited guidance as to how…