- Joined
- Jan 16, 2008
- Messages
- 404
- Reaction score
- 26
It could be the worst. Hard to say.
HA!

You guys are being more ambiguous than an MCAT verbal passage (those things always garbled my mind).
It could be the worst. Hard to say.
It could be the worst. Hard to say.
If you can read more slides per hour that in any other surgical path subspec. and biopsies are abundant, you would want to be in that field when those 88305s decline. How can dermpath be the worst field to go into if reimbursements decline?
If you can read more slides per hour that in any other surgical path subspec. and biopsies are abundant, you would want to be in that field when those 88305s decline. How can dermpath be the worst field to go into if reimbursements decline?
daaa . . . those pesky germans!
What if reimbursement changes so that you get paid for how much you actually work, and not how many cases you actually see? What if salaries normalize between subspecialties due to reimbursement changes? What if people doing the hiring decide they need fewer dermpaths because 75% of dermpath (if not more) can be done by people who have done 1-2 months of training in it?
The people best positioned will likely be those who chose their career path because it is something they enjoy doing, and that they are stimulated to do. Because if you have more of a passion for something you are likely to be more successful at it. If you're just in it to make money, well, people like that are a dime a dozen.
I always wondered how does Medicare decide which fields will receive reimbursement cuts? When they do cut reimbursement, who makes the decision how much will be axed?
If someone could educate me, that would be great.
Thanks a lot.
I always wondered how does Medicare decide which fields will receive reimbursement cuts? When they do cut reimbursement, who makes the decision how much will be axed?
Well first, these guys have to figure out what exactly it is . . . ya do here
![]()
Well that's Dr. Cox... and I don't know the guy on the right..
![]()
I thought with your cool blue hair, goatee, mug of beer and second generation ipod stylings.... you would know about Bob and Bob from OFFICE SPACE.
Watch the movie and learn about it.... Because in a few years most pathologists will be in cubicles passing glasssssssss for a factory.😉
Pathology is the one field in medicine that seems to best fit Office Space model IMHO.
I know the movie, I was being facetious...
.
Well what if they change the rules regarding the billing coding of skins. What if all non-neoplastic skin is coded at 88303 or 88302?
I always wondered how does Medicare decide which fields will receive reimbursement cuts? When they do cut reimbursement, who makes the decision how much will be axed?
If someone could educate me, that would be great.
Thanks a lot.
The way I assume the process goes is that they get a bunch of people in a room who are given the task to cut spending and improve the political impression of health care. These people come into the room with biases from years of experience with the system, maybe even there are a couple of doctors. Then they tell their flunky interns to write it all up, it gets to be about a billion pages. Then a process of immense whining from all sides starts, and small little niche things get inserted here and there (like how we need to institute a 50% increase on reimbursements for barium enemas because someone on the panel has a brother that runs the company with the exclusive contract for barium or whatever). Other things get cut probably based on lack of whining (they don't care, so ditch it). Then they finally present the bill to congress whereupon they attach 8 billion dollars of pet projects and the language gets further changed because of corruption and bias that is rampant in the system (along with incompetence).
And that's probably why MRIs get reimbursed at such a better rate than reading breast core biopsies. In the next round, they will try to cut funding to radiology, I'm sure. Depending on how much whining goes on and who is doing the whining, they probably will to some extent.
And that's probably why MRIs get reimbursed at such a better rate than reading breast core biopsies.
This is what is inane about the system. Anything with whizzz bang technology will get reimbursement at a higher rate.
Why do inexpensive, definitive, Gold Standard tests get such crappy reimbursement?
Is there some sort of conspiracy with ties to R&D and the military industrial complex?
nilf said:Scary. Where do you get your assumptions from? Do you know any insiders involved in the process?
so are dermpath incomes typical large simply due to volume, or are the biopsies of skin billed at a higher rate per specimen?
Is it easier to get a dermpath fellowship coming from derm or path?
Is it easier to setup a lucrative practice as a derm->dermpath because you "know" all the dermatologists in the community and get referals and consults easier?
Who makes the better dermpath in general? I would think pathologists have broader experience reading slides and therefore might be better at it; altough dermatologists have more clinical correlation experience.
Is it easier to get a dermpath fellowship coming from derm or path?
Is it easier to setup a lucrative practice as a derm->dermpath because you "know" all the dermatologists in the community and get referals and consults easier?
for an outpatient histology lab, being able to employ histotechs, transcription etc and actually having the volume to be able support your cash flow needs.
Who makes the better dermpath in general? I would think pathologists have broader experience reading slides and therefore might be better at it; altough dermatologists have more clinical correlation experience.
I'll be honest with you, I love his music, I do, I'm a Michael Bolton fan. For my money, I don't know if it gets any better than when he sings "When a Man Loves a Woman".
It is a number of factors, due mostly to a favorable ratio of time spent per/ bx and the relative strength in CPT coding...
But their BX aren't code any higher than most other BX...
So how much do you get paid per slide? I've heard it was ~$75, but now more like ~$35, so what is the current rate?
Great, but that wasn't the original question (April 2008) nor the more recent question posed by LongDong. . .
the answer to longdongs question is the following
slide reimbursement actually depends a lot on where you are located...for example the cost of reading a slide in new york is more expensive and reimbursed more than reading a slide in jackson, miss
dermpath slides don't really get reimbursed more, just think about it the same way that dermatologists don't get reimbursed more, its just that the majority of their cases are non-emergency and out of pocket expense...so are the dermpath cases...
longdong is asking a basic question. How much does an 88305 currently pay?
dermpath cases are out of pocket (cash)? I think you got it all wrong. Botox is out of pocket. Patients don't come to you with a wad of benjamins for all the biopsies you read.
Yes I don't understand how pathologist bill for their services. My program does educate me on these things but I haven't done my dermpath rotation yet so billing for dermpath is still a ? for me. I've only billed for patients I've seen in clinic. I do look at dermpath everyday though mostly with the fellow or attending. I look at everything I cut out and trust me I cut out a ton of stuff everyday. And no i'm not a med student.Since some here don't really seem to understand how pathologists bill for their services and get paid, here is a question. Does your program educate you on these things? I think they should. My program makes residents code (both CPT and ICD-9, etc) for each case when we dictate the case; maybe that is not the case everywhere. I would think that most every resident in my program knows exactly what the codes mean and has a decent idea what each code reimburses. I imagine most of the posters here who don't get it are probably med students though.
Yes thank you.longdong is asking a basic question. How much does an 88305 currently pay?
ThanksIt varies from market to market but I think it is about $40 in most places for the PC.
What is the salary of a dermpath in PP vs. academia? What is the future of dermpath?
Academic dermpath pwns PP, and is the future of dermpath:
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2009/02/23/us/23pay_graph.html
longdong is asking a basic question. How much does an 88305 currently pay?
dermpath cases are out of pocket (cash)? I think you got it all wrong. Botox is out of pocket. Patients don't come to you with a wad of benjamins for all the biopsies you read.
Yes I don't understand how pathologist bill for their services. My program does educate me on these things but I haven't done my dermpath rotation yet so billing for dermpath is still a ? for me. I've only billed for patients I've seen in clinic. I do look at dermpath everyday though mostly with the fellow or attending. I look at everything I cut out and trust me I cut out a ton of stuff everyday. And no i'm not a med student