Practice Management Alert

Question: We performed a scan on one of our Medicare patients last month, and she complained that none of the physicians in our practice was "old enough" to interpret the results. She insisted that our most senior radiologist interpret the report, but he was in Europe at the time. We sent him the scan results electronically, and he sent a report back to us. Can we report his interpretation even though he was out of the country at the time?

New York Subscriber

Answer: No. International services are off-limits for Medicare patients. According to a notation published on the CMS Web site's "Frequently Asked Questions" area, you cannot report services that practitioners perform outside of the United States. The directive states, "Under the law, physician services paid under the physician fee schedule that are furnished outside the United States are excluded from coverage and payment."

In the future, if a patient insists that a physician who is out of the country read her radiology report or any other test results, you should let her know that Medicare will deny the service, and ask the patient to sign an advance beneficiary notice. This will allow the practice to collect payment directly from the patient after Medicare denies the service.