Purpose: Studies have shown that physicians have a limited understanding of the financial aspects of their interventions. This is especially true for trainees who often receive minimal education on the matter. To improve the understanding of interventional radiology (IR) residents and fellows, we evaluated physician professional fees in the facility setting, global fees in the office setting, and Medicare reimbursement for 10 of the most commonly performed IR procedures. Data was also included on the percentage of each procedure being performed by an IR physician. Materials: The 2016 "Medicare Provider Utilization and Payment Data: Physician and Other Supplier" database was used to extrapolate information regarding providers, type of service, average submitted fee for a service, and average Medicare reimbursement in the "facility" or "office" setting. For this study, we focused on tunneled catheter placement, port placement/removal, fistulogram, venous thrombectomy, venoplasty, venous stenting, IVC filter placement/removal, and tumor embolization.Results: Table 1 summarizes the mean (SD) facility professional fee, mean (SD) office global fee, and mean (SD) Medicare reimbursement. Professional and global fees exhibited broad variability. For example, the mean professional fee for a port removal was 845 with a SD of 345 while IVC filter placement was 2,127 with a SD of 2,835. Overall, 57% of the investigated procedures in the facility setting was performed by IR versus 25% in the office setting. The role of IR varied from 99% (tumor embolization) to 36% (venous stenting) in the facility setting versus 100% (tumor embolization) to 21% (tunneled catheter placement) in the office setting.Conclusions: Knowledge of procedural fees can benefit physicians, especially trainees. It is important for practice development, cost conscious decision making, and patient education. Currently, there is large variability in professional/global fees and IR physician involvement for the evaluated procedures. Mean professional and global (SD) fees, mean (SD) Medicare reimbursement, and the percentage of each procedure performed by IR physicians is provided in table 1 for review.
