Physicians and other practitioners who are paid under the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule (MPFS) bill for common office or other outpatient visits for evaluation and management (E/M) services using a set of Current Procedural Terminology (CPT)* codes that distinguish visits based on the level of complexity, site of service, and whether the patient is new (CPT codes 99201-99205) or established (CPT codes 99211-99215).
For the first time since it was introduced in 1992, the office/outpatient E/M CPT code set has been extensively revised, including the addition of a new code to report incremental time associated with prolonged office or other outpatient services.
Effective January 1, 2021, new reporting guidelines were implemented and code selection for office/outpatient E/M services is based on: