2006 proposed fee schedule - American Society of Clinical Oncology

The CPEPs identified specific inputs involved in each
physician service provided in an office or facility setting.
The inputs identified were the quantity and type of
nonphysician labor, medical supplies, and medical equipment.
In 1999, the AMA's RUC established the Practice Expense
Advisory Committee (PEAC). Since 1999, and until March
2004, the PEAC, a multi-specialty committee, reviewed the
original CPEP inputs and provided us with recommendations
for refining these direct PE inputs for existing CPT codes.
Through its last meeting in March 2004, the PEAC provided
recommendations which we have reviewed and accepted for over
7,600 codes. As a result of this scrutiny, the current CPEP
inputs differ markedly from those originally recommended by
the CPEPs. The PEAC has now been replaced by the Practice
Expense Review Committee (PERC), which acts to assist the
RUC in recommending PE inputs.
b. Allocation of Practice Expenses to Services
In order to establish PE RVUs for specific services, it
is necessary to establish the direct and indirect PE
associated with each service. Our current approach
allocates aggregate specialty practice costs to specific
procedures and, thus, is often referred to as a "top-down"
approach. The specialty PEs are derived from the AMA's SMS
survey and supplementary survey data. The PEs for a given
specialty are allocated to the services performed by that
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