The percentage of patients requiring the highest level of service in the emergency department at Faxton St. Luke’s Healthcare in Utica, NY rose 43 percent in 2009, as reported in the New York Times on September 21, 2012.  Level 5 ED visit services (CPT® code 99285) at Baptist Hospital in Nashville, TN increased by 82 percent in 2010, and by a comparable amount at Methodist Medical Center of Illinois in Peoria.  More than 80 percent of Methodist Memorial’s Medicare ED evaluation and management (E/M) claims were for Level 5 services in 2010, as they were at Yuma Regional Medical Center in Yuma, AZ in 2007.  At Baylor Medical Center in Irving, TX, 64 percent of all ED visits for Medicare patients were Level 5 services, and another 16 percent were Level 4.These are just a few examples of hospitals experiencing a startling rate of growth of high-intensity E/M services during the last few...