The last day for anesthesiologists, pain physicians and other “eligible professionals” (EPs) to begin documenting Meaningful Use of their certified electronic health record (EHR) technology is just two months away.  EPs must start participating in the program by October 3, 2013 and continue for 90 days, through December 31st, to earn an incentive bonus of up to $15,000.  The timeline for 2013 participation is as follows:The incentive payment is 75% of Medicare allowed charges up to a maximum annual cap.  An EP whose first year of demonstrating Meaningful Use (MU) in 2013 can earn a maximum EHR incentive of $39,000 over four years.  (To earn the greatest possible total incentive of $44,000, the EP would have had to start participating in 2012).  If the first year of MU is 2014, the maximum payment is $24,000, as shown below:The EP must successfully demonstrate MU no later than 2014 or face a financial...

In a little more than two months, individuals and small businesses will be able to enroll in health plans offered by the Health Insurance Exchanges (HIEs) created under the Affordable Care Act.  By the deadline of January 1, 2014, all states must have an operational individual and small-business exchange.  The Congressional Budget Office estimates that nine million people will obtain coverage through HIEs in 2014, a number predicted to rise to 22 million people by 2022. Will that mean more patients for anesthesiologists?  Or at least more insured patients?  On the face of things, it seems obvious that better population coverage will lead to a greater number of patients for whom insurance will pay providers.  The current state of development, or lack of development, of HIEs in many localities, however, together with the July 2nd announcement by the U.S. Treasury Department that it will postpone until 2015 the mandate requiring that employers with 50 or...

Just as happens every summer, CMS has released its proposed rule with updates and changes to the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule that will take effect on January 1, 2014.  Not unexpectedly, the Agency is projecting that the sustainable growth rate (SGR) impact would be a 24.4 percent cut in 2014.  Do not bank on this number though.  It is going to change before the end of the year. Of greater significance, CMS has proposed modifications to quality reporting under both the Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS) and electronic health record (EHR) incentive programs.  The basic PQRS principle for 2014 remains the same: eligible professionals (EPs), including anesthesiologists, pain physicians and nurse anesthetists who satisfactorily report data on PQRS quality measures are eligible to receive an incentive bonus equal to 0.5 percent of the total estimated Medicare Part B allowed charges for all covered professional services furnished by the eligible professional or group practice...

Anesthesia practices that accept Visa and MasterCard payments are among the “merchants” that may be able to collect a portion of the fees paid to the card issuers under the proposed settlement in the Payment Card Interchange Fee and Merchant Discount Antitrust Litigation pending in federal District Court in New York.  The class action lawsuit alleges that merchants paid excessive fees for accepting Visa and MasterCard because of an alleged antitrust conspiracy among the Defendant.  According to the complaint, Visa, MasterCard and more than a dozen of the nation's largest credit card issuers conspired to restrain competition by illegally charging higher interchange fees for credit card transactions.  The court granted preliminary approval to the proposed settlement agreement in November, 2012.  On April 11, 2013, the plaintiffs filed for final court approval of the settlement and for attorneys’ fees and expenses.  The court has scheduled a hearing for September 12, 2013 to...

  On January 25, 2013, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Office of Civil Rights (OCR) issued its long-awaited Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) final omnibus regulations (Final Rule). The Final Rule modified the HIPAA Privacy, Security, Enforcement and Breach Notification Rules (HIPAA Rules) and is comprised of four sub-rules: Final modifications to the HIPAA Privacy, Security, and Enforcement Rules mandated by the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act; A final rule adopting changes to the HIPAA Enforcement Rule to incorporate the increased and tiered civil money penalty structure as set forth by HITECH; A final Breach Notification rule; and A final rule modifying the Privacy Rule as required by the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA). While the Final Rule is effective March 26, 2013, compliance with the provisions of the Final Rule is not required until September 23, 2013....