Wiki Preventive: Patient Awareness

[demorrison]

The physician office that I work in has 3 physicians and a NP. We have a lot of patients that make appointments for "annual physicals" and discuss other pre-existing conditions. They end up getting a bill for these services because they don't understand the whole preventive visit. These patients also get very upset, obviously, because they are getting charged for something they "thought" was covered.
How do other offices make their patients aware that preventive services need to be seperate from office visits, or pre-existing conditions?

 

[mitchellde]

Part of the preventive issue is the patient's chronic and pre-existing conditions, they should not be getting a separate charge for this, the separate charge should only be if they have a symptomatic complaint they wish to discuss at the time of the preventive.

 

[Pam Warren]

Debra is correct. Discussion of pre-existing conditions and routine maintenance of chronic disease is part of the routine preventive exam. An additional E&M at the time of a physical should be reserved only in the case of significant additional work relative to an acute new problem, or a severe exacerbation or abrupt change in multiple chronic conditions. Documentation must be specific and separately identifiable. This situation is rare.