Place of Service and Date of Service Instructions for the Interpretation (Professional Component) and Technical Component of Diagnostic Tests

(RESTON, VA) -- Transmittal 1823, that was issued to provide instructions on Place of Service (POS) and Date of Service (DOS) is rescinded and replaced by Transmittal 1873, which announced the delay of the implementation date for DOS requirement to July 1, 2010. While CMS previously issued the POS guidelines to submit the ZIP code for the location of the service, the DOS guideline to use the date of interpretation is new. Note: the place of service requirement in this manual remains effective on Jan. 4, 2010.

In transmittal 1823, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) instructed that the POS code for the interpretation should reflect the actual place where the service was provided, and that the DOS for the interpretation of diagnostic images should designate the date of interpretation.

The ACR, RBMA, HBMA, AHRA, and MGMA requested CMS to delay the implementation of the initial transmittal (Transmittal 1823) by six months due to concerns with the lack of operational preparedness of the industry to implement this new guideline and to get enough time to allow the specialty societies to provide input to address the concerns they have with the guideline.

CMS contractors will provide education to providers about the use of the actual date the interpretation was performed as date of service (DOS) for the interpretation.