President Obama Signs the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014

On April 1, 2014, President Obama signed into law the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014.  This new law prevents a scheduled payment reduction for physicians and other practitioners who treat Medicare patients from taking effect on April 1, 2014. This new law maintains the 0.5 percent update for such services that applied from January 1, 2014 through March 31, 2014 for the period April 1, 2014 through December 31, 2014.  It also provides a zero percent update to the 2015 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) through March 31, 2015.

The new law extends several expiring provisions of law.  We have included Medicare billing and claims processing information associated with the new legislation. Please note that these provisions do not reflect all of the Medicare provisions in the new law, and more information about other provisions will be forthcoming.

Section 101 – Physician Payment Update– As indicated above, the new law provides for a 0.5 percent update for claims with dates of service on or after January 1, 2014, through December 31, 2014. It also provides a zero percent update to the 2015 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) through March 31, 2015. CMS is currently revising the 2014 MPFS to reflect the new law's requirements as well as technical corrections identified since publication of the final rule in November. For your information, the 2014 conversion factor is $35.8228.