Trends in Endoscopic Sinonasal Debridement in the Medicare Population.

Introduction: Nasal/sinus endoscopy with biopsy/polypectomy/debridement, or Current Procedure Terminology code 31237, is one of the top 10 most frequent and highest billed otolaryngology procedures among Medicare patients. We analyzed temporal and geographic trends in endoscopic debridement, and correlated them with sinus surgery and balloon sinuplasty trends.

Methods: Medicare Part-B National Summary Data Files were analyzed from 2000 to 2016 for temporal trends of endoscopic debridement. Medicare Physician and Other Supplier Public Use Files detailing provider information were collected and analyzed from 2012 to 2016. Individual providers performing a reportable number of procedures were included. Linear regression was used to correlate endoscopic debridement, sinus surgery, and balloon sinuplasty procedures.

Results: Between 2000 and 2016, the number of endoscopic debridement procedures increased from 31,579 to 79,762 (6.0% average annual growth). The annual total payments increased from $5,944,582 to $19,438,956 (8.4% average annual growth), with average allowed charge per procedure increasing from $188.24 to $243.71. The greatest and least number of debridement procedures occurred in the Southeast (12,703) and New England (1810) regions, respectively. There was a positive correlation between providers (n = 752) performing endoscopic debridement and sinus surgery (r = 0.31, p < 0.001), which was similar to providers performing endoscopic debridement and balloon sinuplasty (r = 0.29, P < 0.001).

Conclusion: Otolaryngologists continue to perform increasing numbers of endoscopic debridements and receive increasing payments. There is some geographic variation in these trends. Among individual providers, there was a positive correlation between the number of endoscopic debridement procedures and both the number of balloon sinuplasty and sinus surgery procedures.