Use of advance care planning billing codes in a retrospective cohort of privately insured patients

Although advance care planning (ACP) is a component of high-quality care, only one-third of patients report engaging in ACP. On January 1, 2016, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) launched two Current and Procedural Terminology (CPT) codes that allow clinicians to bill for this service. This change was intended to financially incentivize clinicians to engage in ACP, though it is uncertain whether the lack of reimbursement was a meaningful barrier previously. We sought to describe ACP billing code use among privately insured patients in 2016 and to determine which patient characteristics were associated with use of the codes.

National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute