**B. Nationally Covered Indications**

Effective for claims with dates of service on or after October 14, 2011, CMS
will cover annual alcohol screening, and for those that screen positive, up to
four brief, face-to-face, behavioral counseling interventions per year for
Medicare beneficiaries, including pregnant women:

  * Who misuse alcohol, but whose levels or patterns of alcohol consumption do not meet criteria for alcohol dependence (defined as at least three of the following: tolerance, withdrawal symptoms, impaired control, preoccupation with acquisition and/or use, persistent desire or unsuccessful efforts to quit, sustains social, occupational, or recreational disability, use continues despite adverse consequences); and
  * Who are competent and alert at the time that counseling is provided; and,
  * Whose counseling is furnished by qualified primary care physicians or other primary care practitioners in a primary care setting.

Each of the behavioral counseling interventions should be consistent with the
5As approach that has been adopted by the USPSTF to describe such services.
They are:

  1. Assess: Ask about/assess behavioral health risk(s) and factors affecting choice of behavior change goals/methods.
  2. Advise: Give clear, specific, and personalized behavior change advice, including information about personal health harms and benefits.
  3. Agree: Collaboratively select appropriate treatment goals and methods based on the patients interest in and willingness to change the behavior.
  4. Assist: Using behavior change techniques (self-help and/or counseling), aid the patient in achieving agreed upon goals by acquiring the skills, confidence, and social/environmental supports for behavior change, supplemented with adjunctive medical treatments when appropriate.
  5. Arrange: Schedule follow-up contacts (in person or by telephone) to provide ongoing assistance/support and to adjust the treatment plan as needed, including referral to more intensive or specialized treatment.

For the purposes of this policy, a primary care setting is defined as one in
which there is provision of integrated, accessible health care services by
clinicians who are accountable for addressing a large majority of personal
health care needs, developing a sustained partnership with patients, and
practicing in the context of family and community. Emergency departments,
inpatient hospital settings, ambulatory surgical centers, independent
diagnostic testing facilities, skilled nursing facilities, inpatient
rehabilitation facilities and hospices are not considered primary care
settings under this definition.

For the purposes of this policy a primary care physician and primary care
practitioner are to be defined based on two existing sections of the Social
Security Act, 1833(u)(6), 1833(x)(2)(A)(i)(I) and 1833(x)(2)(A)(i)(II):

_1833(u)_  
(6)Physician Defined.For purposes of this paragraph, the term physician
means a physician described in section 1861(r)(1) and the term primary care
physician means a physician who is identified in the available data as a
general practitioner, family practice practitioner, general internist, or
obstetrician or gynecologist.

_1833(x)(2)(A)(i)_  
(I) is a physician (as described in section 1861(r)(1)) who has a primary
specialty designation of family medicine, internal medicine, geriatric
medicine, or pediatric medicine; or (II) is a nurse practitioner, clinical
nurse specialist, or physician assistant (as those terms are defined in
section 1861(aa)(5)).

**C. Nationally Non-Covered Indications**

  1. Alcohol screening is non-covered when performed more than one time in a 12-month period.
  2. Brief face-to-face behavioral counseling interventions are non-covered when performed more than once a day; that is, two counseling interventions on the same day are non-covered.
  3. Brief face-to-face behavioral counseling interventions are non-covered when performed more than four times in a 12-month period.

**D. Other**

Medicare coinsurance and Part B deductible are waived for this preventive
service.

(This NCD last reviewed October 2011.)