Let Your Patients Know You Use Telemedicine
By David Doolittle

As shelter-in-place orders continue in Texas, patient demand for care via telehealth is increasing exponentially. 

To make telemedicine more available, many state and federal rules and regulations regarding telehealth have changed temporarily during the COVID-19 public health emergency, including payments for certain types of visits. 

That’s all good news if you or your practice is struggling financially because of decreased in-person patient visits. But it doesn’t mean much if your patients don’t know about it. 

So if you are offering telemedicine, be sure your patients know they can see you without coming into the office. Send a message through your patient portal, place a notice on your website, and alert patients who call for an appointment. 

It’s also a good idea to update your profile with all your contracted payers so patients who look on those sites know that you are now accepting patients for telemedicine visits.   

Below are the links to update your profile for various payers:  

You may choose to start with your Council for Affordable Quality Healthcare (CAQH) profile or your credentialing service provider. 

• Cigna
• Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas
• UnitedHealthcare
• Aetna (must go through Availity)
• Humana (must go through Availity)
• Medicaid (or through online provider lookup, which requires your login information)
• Medicare does not have a place to indicate to patients whether you see patients via telemedicine. Use some of the other methods we told you about to let your Medicare patients know their doctor can now see them virtually.  

It’s important to know that payment varies by each insurer, so refer to TMA’s matrix of payer policies for telemedicine services, which we are updating as new information becomes available. 

If you would like more help using telemedicine to care for your patients, TMA has published a webinar, Telemedicine During COVID-19, that explains terminology and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ changes, such as what codes you can bill during this time. 

TMA’s Practice Viability Toolkit also has a wealth of information and resources on telemedicine, including:

• Technology;
• Using telemedicine across state lines;
• Prescribing controlled substances;
• Coding and billing, including coding telehealth visits, virtual check-ins, audio-only evaluation and management services, and place-of-service and modifiers; andEducating patients. 

You can find more on TMA’s Telemedicine web page, Practice Viability web page, and COVID-19 Resource Center.

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