Pandemic Telehealth Billings Meet Medicare Test, Watchdog Finds

Physicians and other health-care providers largely complied with Medicare requirements when billing for telehealth services during the first nine months of the Covid-19 pandemic, a report by a federal watchdog found.

The report released this week by the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General reviewed a modest sample of telehealth billings for evaluation and management services from March through November 2020. It found providers followed Medicare billing rules for 105 out of 110 telehealth services sampled.

The findings come after Medicare’s coverage of telehealth services exploded during the pandemic, rising from less than 0.1 percent of ...