CMS Fields Provider Questions on Telehealth & Specimen Collection in National Call

April 10, 2020

CMS hosted an “Office Hours” call on April 9th for healthcare providers to ask questions of agency officials regarding CMS’s temporary actions during the COVID-19 public health emergency. The two topics receiving the most questions by callers concerned: (a) services provided through telehealth by Rural Health Centers, hospice, home health agencies and physicians outside their office settings; and (b) billing only for the swab-specimen collection by hospitals, urgent care centers and physicians. CMS often answered that it was aware of these areas of concern and was hard at work to supply answers. By the end of the call, CMS announced that it had posted an extensive update to its COVID-19 Interim Rule FAQs addressing several of the callers’ questions. Kathie McDonald-McClure, a member of the Firm’s Health Care Services Team, listened to the call and took notes of the call which may be found here.