Women’s Wellness Connection (WWC) is expanding cervical cancer services to include women ages 21-39, tentatively starting January 2017, coinciding with Cervical Health Awareness Month. An initial announcement was made to WWC agencies and stakeholders May 2016. This policy change allows the WWC program, both Clinical Services and Care Coordination, to align with national guidelines for cervical cancer screening age recommendations. Women must continue to meet all other WWC eligibility requirements (income, lawful presence, insurance status) for enrollment. WWC age eligibility for breast cancer screenings will remain for women ages 40-64. To start preparing for this policy change:
- Look for additional information in the WWC Forum and WWC Update in the coming months, including a Cervical Expansion FAQs sheet and cervical case studies involving women 21-39.
- Attend the clinical webinar scheduled for October 5, 2016 from 12-1 p.m. Dr. Jan Shepherd will be discussing cervical cancer screening, diagnostic and treatment services for this younger age population.
- Start planning for EHR and form changes, staff training needs, and internal policy/workflow updates that will include enrolling women ages 21-39 into WWC for cervical screenings.
Please contact the nurse consultant, Angela.FellersLeMire@state.co.us with any clinical questions, including questions regarding the upcoming cervical cancer screening expansion.
WWC is excited to award the WWC Colposcopy Training Scholarship to 21 individual providers at 19 agencies. The scholarship provides funding for additional WWC and Title X Family Planning providers to become trained as colposcopists at the July 27-30, 2016 ASCCP Comprehensive Colposcopy course.
Please wish the awardees good luck as they travel to Rhode Island for the 3 day training course!
The new 2016-2017 WWC Clinical Services CPT Code List is now available. There are no changes in CPT code rates compared to the previous CPT Code List released January 2016. The current CPT Code List is valid from June 30, 2016 through June 29, 2017. Rates are based on information found on the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid website, under physician fee schedule and clinical laboratory fee schedule. As per CMS, the new CPT codes became effective January 1, 2016. As of June 30, 2016, WWC can no longer reimburse for procedures using 2015 CPT codes. The Bundled Payment System (BPS) has also been updated and can be found on the WWC website.
Starting January 2016 HPV genotyping CPT code 87625 was added to the allowable CPT code list. As of June 30th, WWC has added reimbursement for HPV genotyping to the Bundled Payment System at the C3 level. CPT code 87625 should be used for HPV genotyping reimbursement. HPV genotyping determines if a patient is positive for HPV types 16 and 18, and is commonly used following an atypical squamous cells of undetermined significance (ASCUS) result to determine if the patient is a candidate for colposcopy.
Effective June 30: When a same day second diagnostic breast procedure (i.e. breast biopsy) is required in order to reach a final breast diagnosis, agencies may now request additional reimbursement at the CPT code procedure rate. Please email the nurse consultant after both procedure results are entered into eCaST for administrative approval and timely reimbursement.
Please see the fiscal year 2017 Clinical Services Bundled Payment System and CPT Code List to review these changes.
