CMS has announced that the Advisory Panel on Ambulatory Payment Classification (APC) Groups will meet February 18 – February 20, 2009 to review the hospital outpatient hospital APC groups and their associated weights. Specifically, the panel will address: whether procedures within an APC group are similar both clinically and in terms of resource use; APC group weights; packaging of hospital outpatient prospective payment system (OPPS) services and cost; removing procedures from the inpatient list for payment under the OPPS; using single and multiple procedure claims data for CMS’s determination of APC group weights; and other technical issues concerning APC group structure. CMS notes that issues related to calculation of the OPPS conversion factor, charge compression, pass-through payments, or wage adjustments are not within the scope of the APC Panel’s purpose, and these issues therefore will not be considered for presentations and/or comments.