The Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS)  is a program designed by the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to improve the quality of reporting in the healthcare industry. The program is now considered to be permanent and therefore the program name has been amended to the Physician Quality Reporting System (PQRS). Even though "Physician" is in the title of PQRS, physical therapists, occupational therapists, and qualified speech-language therapists can participate to receive incentives when they meet the criteria for “satisfactory reporting” of Medicare claims. There are two ways to report on the quality measures:  claims based reporting and registry based or EMR reporting.

WebPT is one of only two PQRS Certified Registry systems specifically designed for therapists. WebPT obtained certification in 2009 and continues to work with CMS to maintain compliance with our reporting tool that is fully integrated within the WebPT application. 

Meeting PQRS compliance is easy with WebPT. Your therapists simply answer a few extra questions during documentation and the data is collected and stored for your clinic based on the specific measures chosen. It is then prepared for electronic submission and delivered at end of your claim period. Collecting measure data and maintaining 80% or more compliance is done automatically in WebPT.  You can also choose to use the claims based process of reporting as well.

0.5% bonus on medicare reimbursements

By participating in PQRS, each qualified, eligible professional within a clinic, which includes PTs, OTs and SLPs, can earn up to a 0.5% bonus on his/her total estimated allowed charges for Medicare Part B Physician Fee Schedule. This involves completing three or more of the  “eligible measures” (view measures on the APTA site)  on at least 50% of eligible patients for claims based reporting OR 80% with registry based reporting of your Medicare patients during the reporting period.

There's now only 1 PQRS reporting period:

• The entire year (January 1 - December 31)

Participating in PQRS is easy with WebPT

To participate in PQRS:

1. Contact your WebPT Member Representative at 866-221-1870. They will schedule a demo session to show you how this data is collected and then enable WebPT PQRS reporting for your clinic. The system will ensure that your therapists complete the necessary steps so that you can reach your 80% minimum level in order to qualify for the bonus.
2. You have the option of choosing claims or registry based reporting.
3. Once turned on, you will select  the measures in which you would like to participate.

PQRS measures that are supported by WebPT in 2012:

• Adoption/Use of EHR
• BMI Screening and Follow-up
• Diabetic Foot & Ankle Care; Footwear Eval
• Diabetic Foot & Ankle Care; Neuro Eval
• Pain Assessment Prior to Initiation of Therapy
• Documentation and Verification of Medications
• Falls Risk Assessment
• Falls Risk Assessment & Plan of Care

To submit your information to get the bonus:

1. Claims based reporting: Submit your clinic claims manually by gathering all of your applicable PQRS Medicare Notes and report the appropriate quality data codes on service lines of Part B Physician Fee Schedule (PFS) 

        OR

2.    WebPT will submit them automatically for you via registry based reporting.

Our automatic registry submission of your PQRS data takes the hassle out of making sure you have all of the necessary information. All you need to do is cash your bonus checks from CMS!