Medicare fee schedule: Urologists get 5% hit in 2007

Why This Topic Matters

Medicare fee schedule changes can affect reimbursement, budgeting, and coding workflow for urology practices. This article helps readers gauge which service categories are experiencing the largest payment shifts and what broader Medicare policy changes are influencing those results.

Article Sections

1. Overall Medicare fee schedule impact for urology

   Summarizes the year-over-year Medicare payment outlook for urology and discusses the factors driving the overall change. It also introduces the main policy and payment components affecting physician services.

2. Practice expense, conversion factor, and work RVU updates

   Covers the payment methodology changes discussed by CMS and the professional association survey data referenced in the article. It also notes the general effect on relative value unit components and the fee schedule conversion factor.

3. Payment changes for evaluation and management services

   Reviews the article’s discussion of fee changes affecting office and hospital evaluation and management services. This section focuses on the broader service category rather than individual billing details.

4. Imaging-related adjustments and procedure changes

   Addresses imaging payment updates, policy-driven technical component changes, and selected urology procedure categories affected by the fee schedule. It also covers the article’s discussion of supply-cost-related adjustments.

5. Most used urology codes: Medicare 2006 vs. 2007

   Presents the article’s comparison table of frequently billed urology services across 2006 and estimated 2007 payment amounts. The table is organized by office and facility settings and highlights the overall scope of the reimbursement changes.