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The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) published its final rule for the 2006 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule for Part B services in the Federal Register on November 21, 2005. These payment rates apply to all speech-language pathology and audiology Medicare Part B services, except for those audiology services provided to hospital outpatients.
As part of the fee schedule, CMS announced that the conversion factor will be $36.1770, which represents a 4.4% reduction in overall reimbursement rates. Congress is still debating legislation that would increase the conversion factor to 1% over this year’s rate.
The 2006 Medicare Fee Schedule & Hospital OPPS for Audiologists, 2006 Medicare Fee Schedule for Speech-Language Pathologists, and a copy of the CMS final rule can be viewed on ASHA's Web site by ASHA members only. ASHA’s analysis of the 2006 fee schedule provides an overview of new policy changes, reproduces a listing of all procedures used by SLPs and audiologists, calculates the actual national average payment amounts, and describes three methods for accessing the exact payment figure based on geographic location.
To give members the most concise and accurate information available in one location, ASHA carefully analyzes over 1000 pages of CPT codes and payment policies from the Federal Register and AMA CPT Manual (2006). For further information, please contact Mark Kander, ASHA’s Director of Health Care Regulatory Analysis, via e-mail at mkander@asha.org or by phone at 800-498-2071, ext. 4139; or Ingrida Lusis, ASHA’s Director of Health Care Regulatory Advocacy, via e-mail at ilusis@asha.org or at ext. 4482.
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