Rhode Island Blues plan to boost doctors' pay

After years of negotiating fees with individual physicians, the Rhode Island Blues says its switch to an RBRVS-based pay will be more fair.

By Julie A. Jacob, AMNews staff. Nov. 19, 2001.

Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island is increasing its budget for physician reimbursement in that state.

Although the Blues declined to say how much more individual doctors might be paid, Newell Ward, executive director of the Rhode Island Medical Society, said that Rhode Island Blues representatives have told the medical society that physician reimbursement will increase about 7% next year.

Michael Migliori, MD, a ophthalmologist in Providence, said the increase in the Rhode Island Blues' overall budget for physician fees will come as a welcome relief since he has not had a pay increase from the Rhode Island Blues in 11 years.

The reasons for the reimbursement increase, scheduled to begin Jan. 1, 2002, include the Blues scrapping its system of negotiating fees with individual doctors and gradually transitioning to a uniform payment system based on Medicare's resource-based relative value system.

The RBRVS payment system calculates physicians' fees using a formula based on the relative value of the service performed and the costs associated with it.

These changes should result in a fairer, more consistent method of paying doctors, said Scott Fraser, the Rhode Island Blues' spokesman.

"We will be eliminating the individually negotiated agreements with each practice ... We think it is a much fairer reimbursement system," said Fraser. [...]