MINNEAPOLIS, January 8, 2008—The American Medical Association reports that two upcoming deadlines hang over the heads of the nation's physicians.

Deadline #1: Starting March 1, doctors who bill Medicare electronically must include their National Provider Identification numbers (NPIs) on all Medicare claims, in addition to any older IDs they may have been using.

The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has been allowing physicians to use their older, "legacy" identifiers alone fot the past year, giving them time to obtain the new ID numbers.

Deadline #2: After May 23, physicians must use only NPIs on all electronic claims submitted to Medicare and other health care payers.

This means that information discrepancies physicians may be having must be ironed out before then.

These deadlines do not apply to physicians who file only paper claims. But doctors who send their claims to a clearinghouse that then forwards the files electronically will be obliged to comply.

CMS suggests that physicians who have been successfully using both NPIs and older IDs try filing a few smaller test claims right away using only their NPIs, to see if the carrier rejects them.

AMA news release