Billing question

Please see previous post from today regarding reimbursement. You must look deep into the medicare rules. Reimbursement rates grossly go as follows. MDA independently 100%, CRNA independently 85%, MDA supervising AA (up to 4 cases stimultaneously) MDA 50% for each case & AA 50%. MDA supervising CRNA (up to 4 cases stimultaneously) MDA 50% for each case & CRNA 50%.

Please see previous post from today regarding reimbursement. You must look deep into the medicare rules. Reimbursement rates grossly go as follows. MDA independently 100%, CRNA independently 85%, MDA supervising AA (up to 4 cases stimultaneously) MDA 50% for each case & AA 50%. MDA supervising CRNA (up to 4 cases stimultaneously) MDA 50% for each case & CRNA 50%.

Thanks for being so blunt and a bit insulting. Seasoned member or not look at the medicare reimbursement rates and analyze them yourself. The despairities are there. Since you seem to have a better grasp on the concept please enlighten me. I warned you that the example was grossly correct on the numbers. The numbers I have are from my health policy class from a teacher who has a PhD from UCSF in health policy and worked with clinton of overhauling health care policy. Medicare is not fair nor an exact science it is reality. An Addendum according to the 2004 medicare reimbursement fee schedule for non medically directed CRNAs, the conversion rate is the same as the MDA. This is new for 2004. The information I had was based on the 2002 rates. However the medically directed CRNA still splits there fee 50/50 with the MDA who can supervise up to 4 cases. I do not know if the reimbursement is different with regards the the ICD-9 codes and how these are effect which base units are allotted for each case which in the end ultimately effects your reimbursement. The point in the end is that it behooves MDAs to medically supervise CRNAs. This is quite difficult when we can practice independently hence we have the creative genius of the ASA who spawned the AAs. If you research the history of AAs the ASA created them from their early infancy. If you'd like to more from a rookie let me know it is quite an interesting story and will shed even more light on this soap opera of a story.

If you want to know the history of AA's, ask an AA. They were NOT created by the ASA.

The Medicare splits for MD's and anesthetists are not new. They've been around in some form since the mid-80's. And I remember when they came around that a lot of MD's did NOT like it - there were a lot of group practices around with a single anesthesiologist covering a dozen rooms with CRNA's. They were all making a ton of money and would like to have kept it that way.

Funny how a discussion that started about reimbursement deteriorates into AA bashing.