Bill to halt Multiple Procedure Payment Reduction reintroduced in House

Representatives Pete Olson (R-TX), Peter Roskam (R-IL), John Barrow (D-GA) and Betty McCollum (D-MN), along with 38 House cosponsors, have reintroduced the Diagnostic Imaging Services Access Protection Act as HR 846.

As with previous iterations of the bill, HR 846 would stop a 25 percent Multiple Procedure Payment Reduction to Medicare reimbursement for interpretation of advanced diagnostic imaging scans performed on the same patient, in the same session.

The American College of Radiology issued a statement Feb. 28 in support of the bill, arguing the growth in imaging costs has slowed and cuts are unnecessary.

Around the web

The nuclear imaging isotope shortage of molybdenum-99 may be over now that the sidelined reactor is restarting. ASNC's president says PET and new SPECT technologies helped cardiac imaging labs better weather the storm.

CMS has more than doubled the CCTA payment rate from $175 to $357.13. The move, expected to have a significant impact on the utilization of cardiac CT, received immediate praise from imaging specialists.

The newly cleared offering, AutoChamber, was designed with opportunistic screening in mind. It can evaluate many different kinds of CT images, including those originally gathered to screen patients for lung cancer. 

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