CPT and Medicare payment changes – Ophthalmic Professional

Ophthalmic staff need to be aware of these updates for 2022.

We have some new CPT codes to be aware of as of Jan. 1, 2022 as well as payment information on many of these new codes from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) recently released Final Rule of the 2022 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule.

Often, all that CPT releases is a temporary code number — we know a code is coming but not it’s final (usable) billing code for the following year; the CMS release gives us that last bit of information.

We need to be aware of three varieties of code change for 2022 use:

1. Combination codes (taking what has been billed with two separate codes and making a new code to represent both pieces; payment is now for the one and not two)
2. New and deleted codes
3. Code descriptor changes (the code remains, but the actual descriptor language changes).

This article was published in Ophthalmic Professional’s Coding column, and written by Corcoran’s Senior Consultant, Paul Larson, MBA, MMSC, COMT, COE, CPC, CPMA. To view the entire article in Ophthalmic Professional, click here.