Opponents of the government's plans to reduce technical payments for cross-sectional imaging of contiguous body parts and to apply the self-referral laws to nuclear medicine have until the end of this month to voice their disapproval.
Opponents of the government's plans to reduce technical payments for cross-sectional imaging of contiguous body parts and to apply the self-referral laws to nuclear medicine have until the end of this month to voice their disapproval.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has identified 11 families of imaging procedures by imaging modality and by contiguous body area that will be affected by the change. When contiguous body parts are imaged in a single session, CMS proposes to pay 100% for the first procedure and 50% for all others.
Medicare proposes including diagnostic and therapeutic nuclear medicine under the federal referral laws known as Stark II. This would prohibit nuclear medicine physicians from referring patients for imaging to facilities where the referring physicians have a financial interest.
The plan does not apply to the in-office exemption that allows cardiologists to provide nuclear cardiac imaging in their offices, according to CMS officials.
Chest CT Study Shows Higher Emphysema Risk from Combination of Marijuana and Cigarette Smoking
November 28th 2023People who smoke marijuana and cigarettes have 12 times the risk for centrilobular emphysema than non-smokers, according to new computed tomography (CT) research presented at the annual Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) conference.
The Reading Room: Racial and Ethnic Minorities, Cancer Screenings, and COVID-19
November 3rd 2020In this podcast episode, Dr. Shalom Kalnicki, from Montefiore and Albert Einstein College of Medicine, discusses the disparities minority patients face with cancer screenings and what can be done to increase access during the pandemic.
Study Suggests CT-Guided Injections May Restore Sense of Smell in Patients with Long COVID
November 20th 2023Utilizing computed tomography (CT) guidance, researchers have found that performing a minimally invasive anesthetic injection into the stellate ganglia may help address parosmia due to COVID-19, according to study results that will be presented at the annual Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) conference next week.