Appeal type: unknown
Decision: unknown

 The rules say that plans must pay for a medical service or item if regular Medicare would pay for it in this case. You can find this rule at 42 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) Section 422.101.  The rules say that providers/suppliers must report services correctly. Procedures should be reported with the Current Procedural Terminology (CPT) code that describes the services performed. You can find this rule in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Medicare National Correct Coding Initiative Policy Manual for Medicare Services, Chapter I(A).  The rules say that the Correct Coding Initiative was developed to promote correct coding and to control improper coding leading to inappropriate payment in Part B claims. The Coding Policy Manual also explains what is referred to as Column One/Column Two Correct Coding and Mutually Exclusive Edits. These are code pairs that should not be reported together. Medicare Administrative Contractors (MACs) subject all line items for the same beneficiary, same National Provider Identifier (NPI), and same date of service to National Correct Coding Initiative (NCCI) edits. The National Correct Coding Initiative (NCCI) File Formats continue to include a Correct Coding Modifier Indicator (CCMI) for the Column One / Column Two Correct Coding edit file. This indicator determines whether an NCCI Procedure to Procedure (PTP)-associated modifier causes the code pair to bypass the edit. You can find this rule in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Internet Only Manual, Publication 100-04, Medicare Claims Processing Manual, Chapter 23, Section 20.9.  The rules say that physicians in the same group practice who are in the same specialty must bill and be paid as though they were a single physician. If more than one evaluation and management (face-to-face) service is provided on the same day to the same patient by the same physician or more than one physician in the same specialty in the same group, only one evaluation and management service may be reported unless the evaluation and management services are for unrelated problems. Instead of billing separately, the physicians should select a level of service representative of the combined visits and submit the appropriate code for that level. Physicians in the same group practice but who are in different specialties may bill and be paid without regard to their membership in the same group.  You can find this information in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Internet Only Manual, Publication 100-04, Medicare Claims Processing Manual, Chapter 12, 30.6.5  The rules say that a code with a status indicator of B is a bundled code. Payment for covered services with a status indicator of B is always bundled into payment made on other services provided. If RVUs are shown, they are not used for Medicare payment. If these services are covered, payment for them is included in the payment for the services to which they are incident. You can find this information in the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Internet Only Manual, Publication 100-04, Medicare Claims Processing Manual, Chapter 23, Section 30.2.2.  If you want to read these Medicare rules, you can go to this website www.medicareappeal.com.  The Plan contract says that the Plan covers items and services in accordance with Medicare rules.