AAFP passes resolution seeking reimbursement for paperwork

The move is a reaction to what physicians see as increasing demands on them for administrative work.

By Robert Kazel, AMNews staff. Nov. 22/29, 2004.

Physician practices being asked to complete administrative paperwork for no compensation isn't new, but in many doctors' eyes, the load has gotten much worse.

That's why the American Academy of Family Physicians is poised to consider how third-party payers can be persuaded to reimburse doctors for a wide range of tasks their practices are typically doing without extra fees. This work ranges from filling out insurance forms to writing new prescriptions when drug formularies change.

The AAFP's congress of delegates, meeting in October in Orlando, Fla., passed a resolution calling for the organization to help its members understand "how to bill and collect for clinical and administrative services not covered by insurance, and advocate with public and private insurers to recognize the value of, and to appropriately pay for, these services."

The academy also voted to affirm family physicians' right to receive fair reimbursements when they provide management and coordination of complex hospital care concurrently with other doctors.

Mary Frank, MD, president of the AAFP, said the resolution on administrative paperwork represented a boiling over of pent-up unhappiness or "a cumulative effect of what members see as unfair mandates."

"The members became testy," she said. "They're having all this extra paperwork added on to their workload and their workday. They're saying, 'I never needed to do this and this and this and this, and now I'm doing it.' "

Ways to implement the resolution probably will be considered by the academy's Commission on Health Care Services, which is scheduled to meet in January 2005, Dr. Frank said. In general, the objective is to get insurers and not patients to pay doctors for administrative chores, she said. Generally, Medicare and private plans argue that the cost of paperwork is built into what they pay physicians