United Healthcare has announced a new policy intended to direct a long list of procedures to qualified surgical centers. This may be a positive development for anesthesia practices, even though…
Traditionally, anesthesia staffing has involved the assignment of a provider—either a physician or a CRNA—to an anesthetizing location for a line-up of cases. The assumption is that a surgeon performs…
We recently provided you information relative to ultrasonic guidance (USG) in connection with post-operative pain blocks, as reflected by CPT code 76942. As promised, we now turn to the topic…
November 18, 2019 On November 1, 2019, CMS released the 2020 Quality Payment Program (QPP) Final Rule under the MACRA (Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015) law. This…
November 11, 2019 Do you ever get the feeling that things are going along a little too well? At least as it concerns your own personal situation, do you sometimes…
November 4, 2019 In the evaluation of coverage and staffing requirements, the primary focus is always the number of operating rooms (ORs) and delivery (OB) suites in which most anesthesia…
Time marches on. The clock is ticking and the days are flying. Though, at times, we would like nothing more than to slow things down, the passage of time propels…
Virtually every anesthesia service agreement with a facility includes a section entitled, “Medical Director.” This is nothing new. While such language has typically referred to either the chairman of the…
If you had mentioned the word “ultrasound” to teenagers back in the 1960s, I suspect they would have thought you were referring to the psychedelic grooves of Jimi Hendrix or…
Conventional wisdom holds that the better-paying cases are migrating from the traditional inpatient setting to outpatient venues. This explains why today’s larger practices are so focused on growing their surgicenter…