Ultrasound reimbursement

Anonymous

Guest
As an outsider looking-in, it seems to me that Devicor is in a really bad position with the new CMS guidelines for coding....especially in ultrasound (no extra $$ for vacuum assisted). Am I right or am I missing something? I have heard that ultrasound biopsies are the highest-volume compared to x-ray and MRI and so this has to have a huge impact on them.
 






Devicor has minimal U/S VABB business but it will hurt them as they have no alternatives. This could hurt Hologic quite a bit as they are the market share leader in VABB in U/S. Bard should be in pretty good position as they have many non-VABB alternatives, but also risk cannibalizing their own VABB business...and revenues are approximately 75% less for non-VABB devices. Very poor decision by CMS to lump these devices together.