Intellectual Disability Health Check

New items 718 and 719 are being introduced to provide Medicare coverage for an annual health assessment for people with an intellectual disability.

Practice Nurse

New item 10997 will allow services provided by a practice nurse or aboriginal health worker on behalf of a medical practitioner. This will assist patients who require access to ongoing care, monitoring and support between more structured reviews of a care plan by a patient's GP.

Brachytherapy

Items 15338 and 37220 are being amended to increase the upper Gleason Score for prostatic malignancy from 6 to 7 following a recommendation that was made by the Medical Services Advisory Committee.

Double Balloon Enteroscopy

Following a recommendation of the Medical Services Advisory Committee, items 30680-30686 have been introduced for use of this procedure in the diagnosis and management of patients with obscure gastrointestinal bleeding. Item 11820 (capsule endoscopy) has been amended to clarify that it does not cover double balloon enteroscopy.

Endoscopic Ultrasound

Following a recommendation of the Medical Services Advisory Committee, items 30688-30694 have been introduced for use of this procedure (with or without fine needle aspiration) in the staging and diagnosis of patients with specified gastrointestinal neoplasms.

Diagnostic Imaging

The Radiology Management Committee has determined that interim items 56549 and 56551 for CT Colonoscopy be replaced by two new items 56552 and 56554.

There are some minor changes to the MBS anticipated for 1 August 2007. Please keep an eye on the latest news or subscribe to receive free email updates about changes to MBS Online.