nurse practitioners & general surgeons seeing pt's in hospital

We have a NP who will see our inpatient consults in the hospital when our general surgeons are unavailable. In order for the general surgeon to be able to bill for an inpatient consult or admission(for Medicare) they have to see the patient also and dictate as such, correct?

you are correct

The NP would have to bill with their NPI and get paid less than if the surgeon actively participates in the eval and management. Look for Incident To guidelines

nurse practitioners & general surgeons seeing pt's in hospital

Thanks. Have you ever heard of the NP and general surgeon "sharing consults." I was told awhile back that if the NP dictated and the general surgeon dictated, I could combine the two but now I was told since our hospital is critical access, we can't do that. Has anyone heard of this?