Physician's Practice magazine has released, both in print and on-line, the results from their annual Fee Schedule survey. On one hand, I continue to applaud PP's effort. On the other hand, their data continues to diverge from ours considerably. In effect, the fortunes of PCC customers continue to rise while those of PP contributors continue to fall. Is it sample size? Are our clients simply doing that much better than the rest of the world? Does PP measure things different (and somewhat oddly)? I suspect it's a combination of all of the above.

Let's see how the numbers compare. There's so much here that I'll have to split it into a few blog entries, I suspect. Let's start with the big piece, the drop in E&M reimbursement. From the article:

Sorry, but the news is no better today. In fact, it’s disturbingly similar: Another sizeable drop in E&M visit reimbursement.

Here is a quick snapshot of their E&M details:

If you want a closer view, you can find their PDF here.

I took the time and made a similar chart for our clients over the last four years. Check it out. It took me a long time to figure out how to lay this out, so applause is welcome :-)

You'll note that we have a distinctly different pattern of behavior over the last four years. While Physician's Practice magazine reports a distinct negative trend in E&M reimbursement, PCC clients are improving.

In the next day or so, I'm going to zoom in specifically on pediatrics and their results. Anyone here seeing different results?