Webinar for Anesthesia Providers on the ICD-10 ConversionAre You Ready for ICD-10? The Impact on Coding & BillingWednesday, November 20, 2013 at 5:00 p.m. ESTLess than one year from now, the implementation of ICD-10 will impact anesthesia and pain medicine practices across the country. According to CMS, “On October 1, 2014, the ICD-9 code sets used to report medical diagnosis and inpatient procedures will be replaced by ICD-10 code sets.  The transition to ICD-10 is required for everyone covered by HIPAA.”  The delay in implementation by one year gave payors, vendors and practices time to prepare, yet the question to be answered is “Are You Ready for ICD-10?”Anesthesia Business Consultants is offering all interested parties an opportunity to attend an educational webinar on the topic. Darlene Helmer, CMA, CPC, ACS-AN, CMPE, MBA, ABC’s Vice President for Provider Education and Training, will discuss the steps that anesthesia providers should consider taking to...

Physicians who refer or order services for Medicare patients must be enrolled in PECOS, the Medicare Provider Enrollment, Chain, and Ownership System database, and physicians who bill Medicare are required to list the name and National Provider Identifier (NPI) of the ordering/referring physician on their claims in order to be paid.  The source of these requirements is Section 6405 of the Affordable Care Act. CMS is about to implement an automatic edit so that claims submitted on or after May 1st for certain services ordered by a physician or healthcare provider who is not enrolled in PECOS, even if his or her name and National Provider Identifier (NPI) are on the claim, will be denied.  This change may affect a relatively small but important set of anesthesiologists, who have raised questions about the issue.  As part of the pre-operative evaluation of surgical patients, anesthesiologists may order clinical laboratory or even imaging...