AMA Releases Latest CPT Updates to Align with Medicare E/M Changes, Digital Innovation

The American Medical Association (AMA) released updates to its medical codes for 2021 designed to align with a Medicare rule set to take effect in January.

The updates to medicine’s common language aim to reduce documentation requirements for clinicians and free physicians and care teams from clinically irrelevant administrative burdens that led to time-wasting note bloat and box checking, according to the AMA.

The revised E/M office visit codes are among 329 editorial changes in the 2021 CPT code set, including 206 new codes, 54 deletions, 69 revisions. The CPT code set continues to see growth in new and novel areas of medicine, with the majority (63%) of new codes this year involving new technology services described in Category III CPT codes and the continued expansion of the Proprietary Laboratory Analyses (PLA) section of the CPT code set.
Among this year’s important additions to the CPT code set are new medical testing services sparked by the public health response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The CPT code set has been modified with several code additions and revisions that have been approved for immediate use and published for the 2021 CPT code

Source: https://www.fiercehealthcare.com/practices/cpt-updates-2021-align-medicare-e-m-code-changes-keep-pace-digital-health-innovation