|
Question:
What are the CPT codes for providing care to my patients via the telephone or online?
Answer:
CPT codes: 99441-99444 and 98966-98969 are effective as of January 1, 2009, relating to billing for Patient Phone calls and internet online medical care. There are six time-based codes for reporting telephone care. These new codes are intended for use in situations where an established patient is seeking advice or treatment for a problem that does not require a face-to-face visit. There are two online service codes for reporting patient care provided in an online method. These telephone codes are time-based codes, so time spent must be documented. Both telephone care and online care require documenting the nature of the service and pertinent details for the medical record. Medicare has assigned RVUs and pricing for these new codes. At this time Medicare has designated these codes as Non-Covered services. This means that physicians are free to bill–and be paid for–the services described by these codes. Commercial plans will develop their own coverage policies; many will follow Medicare’s lead. More info
Question:
Should a small or medium practice choose to host their EMR themselves or should they go with an ASP solution where the EMR is provided and hosted at a Data Center?
Answer:
When hosting the EMR yourself several things need to be considered. The resources required to keep the application up and available require attention 24/7. Second, does your practice have the equipment, such as Servers and the IT support staff available to provide for this.? Since the average lifespan of a Server is 3 years, consider the cost and frequency required to keep the computer systems upgraded. Using an ASP service or Hosting service, often a benefit would be the purchase cost of the EMR is waived because you are typically paying a monthly fee to use the Application as a “subscription” option rather than purchase. Installation expense is also going to be less. The monthly fee typically includes support and updates for your EMR. ASP hosted solution will also provide additional services such as backing up of data, quicker response to application error issues and one point of support for everything.
Question:
What do I need to consider when reviewing an EMR?
Answer:
Our first question to you is, what are you wanting? What features and benefits are important to you? Who will be using the software? It is very important that you DO YOUR HOMEWORK. Unfortunately about 1/3 of the practices that purchase an EMR stop using it within a year.
Source: http://www.ama-assn.org
It is our desire that you know what you are wanting and are committed to accomplishing the desired end result. Also, be aware that no EMR software can read your mind, think for you, be everything. The success of implementation is dependent on you and your staff – SuiteMedMD / AIM Services will fulfill our obligation, but we must have 100% support from you the customer. So again, “do your homework”, have your questions for us so we can illustrate the benefits and features of our product and hopefully answer all of your questions during a demonstration.
Question:
I hear the term EMR and EHR, what is the difference?
Answer:
Although many people use the terms “EHR” and “electronic medical record” interchangeably, professionals in the medical and health care informatics commonly define the electronic medical record as the electronic record created in a hospital or ambulatory clinic, whereas the EHR is a longitudinal record – ie it receives information from multiple sources (including electronic medical records) and “follows” the patient across different provider organizations.
Source: http://www.ccjm.org/content/74/11/826.full.pdf+html
|
Q&A