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Medical Nutrition Therapy Services--Overview Nutrition and diet play an important role in helping people with certain diseases manage their health. For people with diabetes or renal diseases, proper diet and nutrition can help prevent and reduce complications from their conditions. Medicare covers medical nutrition therapy services for people with diabetes or renal diseases to help them manage their conditions. What Medicare covers: Medicare covers medical nutrition therapy services prescribed by a physician for beneficiaries with diabetes or a renal disease. For purposes of disease management, this benefit includes: 1. An initial assessment of nutrition and lifestyle assessment 2. Nutrition counseling 3. Information regarding managing lifestyle factors that affect diet 4. Follow-up visits to monitor progress managing diet Medicare covers 3 hours of one-on-one counseling services the first year, and 2 hours each year after that. If the beneficiary's condition, treatment, or diagnosis changes, he or she may be able to receive more hours of treatment with a physician's referral. A physician must prescribe these services and renew their referral yearly if continuing treatment is needed into another calendar year. Under Fee-for-Service Medicare, beneficiaries pay 20% of the Medicare-approved amount after meeting the yearly Part B deductible. *Starting January 1, 2006, Medicare is expanding coverage for medical nutrition therapy services to include individual medical nutrition therapy delivered via an interactive telecommunications system. Other helpful information: Medicare covers other services to help people with diabetes manage their health, such as diabetes self management training services. Beneficiaries with diabetes may take advantage of both the medical nutrition therapy and diabetes self-management training benefits in the same year. However, they are different benefits and require separate referrals from physicians or qualified non-physician practitioners. The medical evidence reviewed by CMS suggests that medical nutrition therapy services are more effective if provided after the completion of the initial diabetes self-management training benefit. Links to nutrition information and resources for people with diabetes or a renal disease are provided below.
Page Last Modified: 12/14/2005 9:46:00 AM
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