Our Remote Therapeutic Monitoring Solution is only available for organizations with Enterprise subscriptions using HEP. To turn this feature on or upgrade your organization's subscription, please contact your Account Manager or request a demo.
In January 2022, CMS released new CPT codes that allow providers to bill for Remote Therapeutic Monitoring (RTM). Remote Therapeutic Monitoring allows providers to bill for the remote management of their patients with musculoskeletal and respiratory conditions using medical devices (including certain software) that collect non-physiological data.
Prescribing home exercise programs to patients is standard practice for many providers, but until now, providers haven’t been incentivized to interact with patients between sessions to monitor and encourage adherence to their home exercise programs. With these new CPT codes, providers can be reimbursed for the time they spend completing these activities. For more information on RTM and the new CPT codes, view this article.
How RTM Works
Providers can use the MedBridge Patient Engagement Solution to:
- Enroll patients in Remote Therapeutic Monitoring (RTM)
- Assign, monitor, and update programs in real time
- Communicate with patients between visits
- Access patient-level reporting and analytics to identify opportunities for RTM billing
The diagram below represents an example workflow demonstrating how your team can use MedBridge to help satisfy the billing requirements for RTM services.
Above you can see the workflows for both patients and providers:
- The flow starts when the care team creates a patient profile and enables RTM within the MedBridge platform.
- The care team then creates or updates a home exercise program, shares the program with the patient via email or text, and educates the patient on how to use the patient portal or app.
- The patient then accesses and engages with their program by logging exercises, responding to weekly check ins, and providing feedback to the provider in-between visits.
As the patient interacts within the MedBridge Go app or online patient portal by logging exercise activity, sending messages, or responding to surveys, their activity is tracked. Your care team can then review this activity with MedBridge to make both clinical and RTM billing decisions.
When the engagement thresholds defined by your organization are met, your care team will be eligible to bill against the engagement-based codes (98975, 989776, and 98977).
As the care team reviews adherence data and patient feedback within the MedBridge application, they will have the opportunity to document the interactions that they have performed with the patient. This includes time spent monitoring and updating a program, communicating with patients via messages, and remote interactions such as video or phone calls.
The care team can easily review patient and provider activity each month and decide what is appropriate to bill for the time-based codes (98980 and 98981) as the required thresholds defined by your organization are met.
Learn more about how to use MedBridge to support RTM by visiting the RTM Help Center.