Billing for telephone psychotherapy for calls less than 16minutes

[ljhaley@gmail.com]

Hello everyone!
I have been reading CMS, and psychiatry.org and a few other resource sites regarding billing for telephone psychotherapy for less than 16 minutes. Most sites say for anything less than 16 minutes-do not report. From 16 min-37 min report 90832. Here's the scenario- we have an out of town college student that phones in (NOT interactive video) to speak with his counselor and quite often its only for 3, 4, 5, 9 or 13 min calls. Are we NOT allowed to bill for these at all? does it HAVE to be at least 16 min to bill for? Or should we be using E&M codes like 99211/99212/99213? Again pt is NOT face to face, not video, just a phone call. He calls a few times a month-is there some way to combine these and bill? Appreciate any help you can give. thanks!

 

[MJ4ever]

Hi,
I have never heard of coding psychotherapy fo T-Cons.
Try 99441/99442/99443. (http://www.medicarepaymentandreimbursement.com/2010/10/can-radiation-oncologist-bill-99441.html)
These are time based and should be more appropriate to use. A therapist has told me in the past there's not much therapy you can provide in 5 minutes, but then I'm not a provider.
Also, that's correct, anything less than 16 min in therapy is not code able.
Hope this helps,
Barbara

 

[mitchellde]

The phone codes 99441-99443 must be calls initiated by the patient not the therapist and cannot be scheduled calls.

 

[MJ4ever]

That's correct. T-Cons have to be patient initiated and be established patients only, not new.

 

[ljhaley@gmail.com]

Barbara and mitchellde THANK YOU!!! That was super helpful- both the validation of the "no bill for less than 16" rule, and providing coding guidance to exactly what I need! I saw those T-phone consult codes in my CPT book, but no one here ever used them... Grateful thanks!

 

[MJ4ever]

Sweet, glad it helped