Following up on last year’s announced introduction of special payments to physicians who care for seniors with chronic medical conditions, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has published a draft regulation that provides further information about how those payments would work.

Under the proposed rule, Medicare will pay physicians $41.92 for non-face-to-face management of chronic care services for selected Medicare patients.  Physicians could receive no more than one such payment per patient per month for activities that include the development and revision of care plans, communication with the involved patient’s other providers, and prescription drug management.

The proposed policy, part of Medicare’s annual regulation updating physician payment policies and rates, addresses other aspects of Medicare’s proposed changes in its approach to chronic care management as well.  To learn about these changes, see a CMS fact sheet on the new regulation here or find the entire regulation here.