Urgent Care Centers: Switch to Digital Radiography or Lose Money

Urgent care operators who have adopted digital radiography (DR) will tell you it’s cheaper to maintain, less cumbersome to operate, and overall just more efficient to use than old-school analog x-ray systems. Now you can add Medicare to DR’s proponents—and they’re putting your money where their mouth is. Come 2017, Medicare will start reducing payments for exams performed on analog x-ray systems by 20%. Starting in 2018, urgent care centers using computed radiography (CR) will also see their reimbursements go down by 7% over the next 5 years if they don’t switch to DR. After 5 years, reimbursements will go down 10% for centers using CR. Teleradiology Associates, which concentrates its business on the urgent care setting, points out in a blog post on its website that the implications of the incoming rule go beyond treatment of Medicare members; occupational medicine providers should bear in mind that it’s typical for commercial and workers’ compensation payers to follow the Medicare fee schedule and payment methodology.