Docs often say colleagues prescribe unnecessary care

May 5 2014

Elsewhere, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid services sets a new date for doctors to adopt a new coding practice and Medicare may follow advice against giving smokers annual CT scans.

Kaiser Health News: Doctors Think Others Often Prescribe Unnecessary Care
Three out of four physicians believe that fellow doctors prescribe an unnecessary test or procedure at least once a week, a survey released Thursday finds. The most frequent reasons that physicians order extraneous -- and costly -- medical care are fears of being sued, impulses to be extra careful and desires to reassure their own assessments of the patient, the survey said (Rau, 5/1).

Modern Healthcare:  Physician Anxieties Linger As CMS Sets Oct. 2015 Conversion Date For ICD-10
The countdown has restarted toward the compliance deadline with the federally mandated conversion to the ICD-10 diagnostic and procedural codes. The new ICD-10 start date is Oct. 1, 2015, according to a terse statement from the CMS (Conn, 5/1).

Modern Healthcare:  CMS Expected To Follow Panel Advice Against CT Scans For Smokers 
Some experts are predicting that the CMS will go along with Wednesday's controversial decision by an advisory panel not to recommend Medicare coverage of annual CT scans to detect lung cancer in heavy smokers (Dickson, 5/1).