Forum - Questions & Answers
Medicare billing for J1094
Why is Medicare requesting a copy of the invoice for Dexamethasone whenever we bill it with a trigger point injection. This started in 2011 and I really have not found an answer to this problem.
re: Medicare billing for J1094
The only explanation I got from Medicare was that the FDA has it listed as discontinued on their website (which it has been for several years, now.)
It wasn't pulled for safety or effectiveness reasons, and it is listed as "discontinued" in the FDA orange book, but ONLY under 2 manufacturers. The problem is, those manufacturers no longer produce it AT ALL. Now, only compounding pharmacies distribute it, and although they have NDC #'s, they're not listed in the NDC directory, so they can't be verified without asking the FDA directly. Medicare is completely silent on the change - for as much useless information as they have on their maze-of-a-website, there's absolutely nothing about why this code was removed from the fee schedule. It was just there last year, and now it's not. That's all I've been able to find out...I'm about to just say "screw it" and go on - we get reimbursed less than $.25/unit anyways.