Modifier GT

Modifier GT used to be Medicare’s telehealth flag. Under earlier guidance, a practitioner billed the procedure code for the visit and added GT to show the patient had been seen over a live audio and video link rather than in the room. When CMS introduced place of service code 02 for telehealth in 2017, the code itself came to certify that a service met the telehealth requirements, which left the modifier doing the same job twice.

CMS removed the duplicate in Transmittal 3929, change request 10152¹. From January 1, 2018, Medicare contractors no longer require GT on professional telehealth claims, and the place of service code carries the information; since January 1, 2024, that means POS 02 or POS 10, depending on whether the patient is at home². GT survives on one Medicare claim type. A critical access hospital that has elected optional payment Method II, billing for a practitioner who reassigned benefits to it, still submits the distant site service on an institutional claim with GT. Medicare pays that service at 80 percent of the physician fee schedule facility amount for the distant site².

The mistake runs in both directions: GT appended to Medicare professional claims, where it adds nothing since 2018, and GT left off Method II institutional claims, where it is still required. Outside Medicare, a Medicaid program or commercial plan publishes its own telehealth rules, so read the payer’s policy before deciding whether a line carries GT, modifier 95 or neither.