Discussion: Reimbursement Issues for Nurse Practitioners

Understanding the complex process of accurate coding and billing is essential to a sustainable practice. As NPs, we are ultimately responsible for ensuring all coding and billing is accurate for each patient seen. For this Discussion, you will search the health care literature and summarize a peer-reviewed journal article published within the last five years.

To prepare:

• Select one of the following topics:
  • Applying for Medicare and Medicaid Provider Numbers
  • Application process for National Provider Identifier Number
  • Incident to billing
  • Coding-Evaluation & Management
  • Fraudulent billing
  • Billing Self-Pay patients
  • Managed Care Organizations
• Conduct a search and select a peer-reviewed journal article published within the last five years related to the topic you selected.

Note: For this Discussion, all students are to avoid all written work, which reviews or outlines coding and billing at previous or current worksites as well as previous or current practicum sites.

By Day 3

Post a brief summary of the article you selected. Include the key reimbursement issue addressed and how they would impact the NP in a collaborative practice versus and independent practice. Discuss an ethical or legal implication(s) associated with your article.