Tag: Medicare reimbursement

It’s complicated. A deep dive into the Viz/Medicare AI reimbursement model.

Sep 24, 2020• 1

By LUKE OAKDEN-RAYNER

In the last post I wrote about the recent decision by CMS to reimburse a Viz.AI stroke detection model through Medicare/Medicaid. I briefly explained how this funding model will work, but it is so darn complicated that it deserves a much deeper look.

To get more info, I went to the primary source. Dr Chris Mansi, the co-founder and CEO of Viz.ai, was kind enough to talk to me about the CMS decision. He was also remarkably open and transparent about the process and the implications as they see them, which has helped me clear up a whole bunch of stuff in my mind. High fives all around!

So let’s dig in. This decision might form the basis of AI reimbursement in the future. It is a huge deal, and there are implications.

Uncharted territory

The first thing to understand is that Viz.ai charges a subscription to use their model. The cost is not what was included as “an example” in the CMS documents (25k/yr per hospital), and I have seen some discussion on Twitter that it is more than this per annum, but the actual cost is pretty irrelevant to this discussion.

For the purpose of this piece, I’ll pretend that the cost is the 25k/yr in the CMS document, just for simplicity. It is order-of-magnitude right, and that is what matters.

A subscription is not the only way that AI can be sold (I have seen other companies who charge per use as well) but it is a fairly common approach. Importantly though, it is unusual for a medical technology. Here is what CMS had to say:

Health Care Future Bright for Nurses. Stinks for Doctors.

Jul 14, 2012• 37

By MERRILL MATTHEWS

There are lots of losers in President Obama’s effort to remake the U.S. health care system, and chief among them are the doctors. But there are also winners, especially nurses and physician assistants (PAs). Indeed, nurses and PAs win big in part because doctors lose badly.

Surveys repeatedly show doctors are fed up with low reimbursement rates from Medicare and even lower from Medicaid, which have increasingly led doctors to no longer see new patients in those government-run plans. For example, a recent Texas Medical Association survey found that “34 percent of Texas doctors either limit the number of Medicare patients they accept or don’t accept any new Medicare patients.” Even more do not accept patients with Medicaid.

Then there’s the heavy-handed regulations and requirements from both government and private health insurers. Complying with all those requirements and paperwork creates expensive and time-consuming administrative burdens. And to top it off, there’s the looming shadow of a high-cost lawsuit if things don’t turn out well.

And that’s all before ObamaCare kicks in, which will exacerbate every one of those problems. So it’s little wonder that there are physician shortages, especially in lower-paying primary care, and those shortages are only going to get worse if ObamaCare succeeds in getting an estimated 32 million more Americans insured.

The increased demand for medical care and lower reimbursements—which is one of the primary ways ObamaCare will try to hold down costs—is a recipe for a mass exodus of doctors willing to practice medicine. As “Physicians Practice” reported in August from its physician survey: “Nineteen percent say they plan to move to another position in the same field. An equal amount says they plan to leave medicine—not to retire, but to pursue something new.”

To Know and Be Known

Apr 30, 2010• 7

By ROB LAMBERTS, MD

I was happy when I looked at today’s schedule.

Two husband and wife pairs were on my schedule, both of whom have been seeing me for over ten years. Their visits are comfortable for me; we talk about life and they are genuinely interested in how my family is doing. They remember that I have a son in college and want to know how my blog and podcast are doing. I can tell that they not only like me as a doctor; they see me, to some degree, as a friend.

Another patient on the schedule is a woman from South America. She has also been seeing me for over ten years. I helped her through her husband’s sudden death in an accident. She brings me gifts whenever she goes on her trips, and also brings very tasteful gifts for my wife. Today she brought me a Panama hat.

I know these people well. I know about their past illnesses and those of their children. I know about their grandchildren, having hospitalized one of them over the past year for an infection. I know about the trauma in their lives as well as what they take joy in. They tell me about their trips and tell me their opinions about the health care reform bill.

I spend a large part of their visits being social. I can do this because I know their medical situation so well. I am their doctor and have an immediate grasp of the context of any new problems in a way that nobody else can. This is not just in the context of their own medical ecosystem, it is in the larger family context. This means that I know how to read between the lines when they say something – knowing what I can ignore and what subtle things are out of character. This also means that I don’t have to practice defensive medicine – as I not only have a low risk of lawsuit, I also can rely on my intimate knowledge of them to keep excessive ordering of tests and referrals to a minimum.

That is the joy of primary care that doesn’t get talked about as often as it should: I have a genuine personal investment in my long-term patients. I know them and am known by them. It is also a much more efficient way to practice medicine. I don’t have to order tests to get information when my personal information is so great.

A 21% cut in Medicare may have put an end to it. When we were staring down the barrel of losing that much revenue, we seriously talked about our threshold for dropping Medicare. The political game of chicken was not only played at the expense of physicians, it put great fear into many of my long-term patients that they would lose me as their doctor. Yes, many of them would probably ante up and pay cash to maintain that relationship, but a new negative dynamic would definitely be thrown into the mix. Some just couldn’t afford to pay me out of pocket (even with a discount).

We need a system that encourages relational medicine rather than discouraging it as our system does now. Getting a bunch of mid-level providers in Walgreens is not the same as having an adequate primary care workforce. I cherish my relationships with these people and they are, to a very large extent, the reason why I haven’t seriously contemplated dropping Medicare until recently. I am a very important part of their lives – a stabilizing force that helps them deal with the difficulties of getting older and getting sick. But they are an important part of my life as well. I have a personal stake in their health because they bring me joy and connection.

After the visit, I gave the woman a big hug. I was wearing my Panama hat.

My nurse says it would look good with my Jimmy Buffett shirt.

Rob Lamberts, MD, is a primary care physician practicing somewhere in the southeastern United States. He blogs regularly at Musings of a Distractible Mind, where this post first appeared. For some strange reason, he is often stopped by strangers on the street who mistake him for former Atlanta Braves star John Smoltz and ask “Hey, are you John Smoltz?” He is not John Smoltz. He is not a former major league baseball player. He is a primary care physician.

Medicare Policy Might Discourage Proper Care for Hospital-Acquired Infections

Sep 29, 2009• 7

By MAYA SEQUEIRA

Medicare’s recent policy of refusing to pay hospitals’ additional costs to treat hospital-acquired infections fails to adequately incentivize prevention and proper treatment of these complications, associated with 99,000 deaths annually. A recent analysis by Peter McNair and colleagues in the journal Health Affairs suggests that, in the entire state of California, only 11 hospitalizations complicated by infection would have received lower reimbursement as a result of the policy if it had been in place in 2006.The Medicare policy focuses on infections that have low mortality, such as catheter-associated urinary tract infections, and infections that affect few people, such as mediastinitis after CABG surgery. This means that the vast majority of severe hospital-acquired infections remain completely unregulated.