Physician Specialty Code for Interventional Cardiology

This article was revised on September 26, 2014, to reflect the revised CR8812 that was issued on September 23. In the article, the CR release date, transmittal number, and the Web address for accessing the CR are revised. All other information remains the same.

 Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is establishing a new physician specialty code for Interventional Cardiology. The CR is also changing the description of specialty code 62, and updating the names associated to specialty codes 88 and 95. Make sure your billing staffs are aware of these changes.


Physicians who enroll in the Medicare program self-designate their Medicare physician specialty on the Medicare enrollment application (CMS-855B) or via the Internet-based Provider Enrollment, Chain, and Ownership System (PECOS). Non-physician practitioners who enroll with Medicare are assigned a Medicare specialty code. These Medicare physician/non-physician practitioner specialty codes describe the specific/unique types of medicine that physicians and non-physician practitioners (and certain other suppliers) practice. They become associated with the claims that physician or non-physician practitioners submit; and are used by CMS for programmatic and claims processing
purposes.

CR 8812 establishes a new physician specialty code for Interventional Cardiology (C3). CR8812 is also removing the word “Clinical” from the description of specialty code 62 (Psychologist (Billing Independently)), and is changing the description of specialty code 88 to “Unknown Provider,” and of specialty code 95 to “Unknown Supplier”. The changes to the descriptions for codes 88 and 95 align their names with their intended usages.