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- Mar 17, 2003
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So I saw that congress reversed the 27% cut to Medicare rates and In order to pay for it slashed 2.7 billion to clin lab fees and ended the tc grandfather clause
I don't think this will hurt working pathologists all that much. Certainly it is good to avoid the27% cut for another year, and cutting lab payments will only hurt hospital corporations, universities and mega labs. The grandfather clause isn't that vig of a deal to most pathologists either. It just allows pathologists to bill cms for tc on inpatient cases in select cases where the hospital is too rural to have an ap lab. It allowed a double dip for inpatient tc. Once via the drg to the hospital and once for the outpatient lab. It more hurts the small hospitals as they will now have to pay the pathology labs for processing their cases although it will hurt the pathologists some as I doubt they will pay the standard cpt codes.
I don't think this will hurt working pathologists all that much. Certainly it is good to avoid the27% cut for another year, and cutting lab payments will only hurt hospital corporations, universities and mega labs. The grandfather clause isn't that vig of a deal to most pathologists either. It just allows pathologists to bill cms for tc on inpatient cases in select cases where the hospital is too rural to have an ap lab. It allowed a double dip for inpatient tc. Once via the drg to the hospital and once for the outpatient lab. It more hurts the small hospitals as they will now have to pay the pathology labs for processing their cases although it will hurt the pathologists some as I doubt they will pay the standard cpt codes.
