How are patients attributed to a physician?
Each patient who is eligible for a measure is attributed to the physician(s) of the designated specialties based on the number of ambulatory evaluation and management visit during the time specified for that measure. Relevant specialties are designated for each quality measure. Primary care physicians A patient is attributed to the single primary care physician who that patient saw most frequently during a 24-month period – the measurement year and the prior year. Primary care must be one of the relevant specialties for a given measure to attribute a patient to the primary care physician. A PPO patient must have had a minimum of two visits with the primary care physician to be attributed to that physician. An HMO patient must have had a minimum of one visit to be attributed to a primary care physician. Specialists A patient can be attributed to one or more specialist physicians who that patient saw during the measurement year. The specialist’s primary specialty must be one of the relev
