Groups seek insight into HCFA's practice expense refinement process

Why This Topic Matters

Understanding how HCFA refines relative value units affects Medicare reimbursement and can influence how practices interpret upcoming fee schedule changes and payment impacts across specialties.

Article Sections

1. Stakeholder comments on practice expense refinement

   Summarizes concerns and requests from specialty societies about HCFA’s process for refining practice expense values and related payment methodology.

2. Comments on evaluation and management code refinements

   Describes differing views on the implementation of refinement inputs for a set of evaluation and management services and the broader impact on relative value unit assignments.

3. Gastroenterology response to new endoscopic stenting codes

   Covers comments from gastroenterology organizations on new procedure codes and their assigned work value methodology within the fee schedule update.

4. Publication of non-Medicare service values

   Addresses objections to a possible change in how certain fee schedule values are published and who relies on that information.