This week, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) announced that physicians participating in the new Physician Quality Reporting Initiative (PQRI) can now quickly search for applicable measures and detailed specifications. The “Measure Finder” tool can be found on the the PQRI website.  This tool will allow users to search for applicable measures based on a single code or a combination of codes.

The tool kit also contains educational resources and measure-specific worksheets designed to walk the user step by step through reporting for each measure.

PQRI is a voluntary reporting program that encourages quality improvement through the use of clinical performance measures. It establishes financial incentives – bonus payments of 1.5 percent of total allowed charges for covered Medicare physician services – for physicians who participate in this voluntary program. The current reporting period is for claims with dates of service from July 1 through December 31. Claims must be received on or before February 29, 2008, to be included in the bonus payment calculation.

Contact: Sandra Bressler, 415/882-5171 or sbressler@cmanet.org.