Telehealth on the rise, page-1948

not sure you understood that article at all. it is also 4 years old and clearly written for a push to change rebates that was happening at that time and not relevant for today.

the point the ama is making on this however.
radiology rebates have been essentially frozen for the last 17 years in fact we earn less now from the government than we did back then with costs and wages significantly higher. it gets a point that bulk billing is not sustainable. infact ultrasound is the worst where bulk billing is essentially working for free these days unless you are doing massive numbers and compromising patient care.
if we as a business cannot make money from an exam than a gap needs to be paid. this article is suggesting that if the medicare amount was to reduce than radiologists would increase gaps to cover. if you are going to charge a gap you lose even more money from medicare (approx 15%) and to cover this the gap needs to be significant ie $50-$100 per item.

this has nothing to do with how much money governments can save from radiology or ressapp for that matter.

those figures above ARE NOT what the radiology medicare fee but a hypothetical out of pocket cost if the government didn't change things 4 years ago