Wiki time for mental health visits

[pscott]

If a patient is seen for 50 minutes instead of 45, how do you charge for that?
I found this chart, so am wondering if it's correct.
units on CMS 1500 Applied to session count Time
.5 1/2 session up to 44 min
1 1 session 45-74 min
1.5 1 1/2 75-104 min
2 2 sessions 105-120 min

Thanks!

 

[Skymom]

A 50 minute session would be 1 unit of 90834. (See AMA's CPT Professional 2019, p 641).

90832 = 16 - 37 minutes
90834 = 38 - 52 minutes
90837 = 53 + minutes

Generally you can bill one of the above codes one time per day (check your various payer guidelines). You cannot add codes together to account for time. If a provider sees a patient for 90 minutes, that's 90837 x 1. You cannot bill for a session that is 15 minutes or less. Not sure what your chart is trying to illustrate with the decimals, but only the number 1 is appropriate to describe the unit for these CPT codes.