The Telehealth Coverage Act of 2025 permanently expands and solidifies various telehealth flexibilities under Medicare, removes certain in-person visit requirements, and establishes new guidance for language access and specific service delivery.
Ro Khanna
Representative
CA-17
The Telehealth Coverage Act of 2025 aims to permanently expand access to telehealth services under Medicare by making temporary flexibilities permanent, including coverage for audio-only services and removing certain in-person visit requirements. The bill also extends flexibilities for hospital-at-home care and establishes new requirements for language access and documentation for remote services, such as hospice recertification. Furthermore, it expands access to virtual programs for diabetes prevention and mandates education for providers on screening for medication-induced movement disorders via telehealth.
New Telehealth Bill Makes Audio-Only Doctor Visits Permanent for Medicare, Removes In-Person Follow-Ups for Key Services
When the pandemic hit, everyone started seeing their doctor on a screen or over the phone. For Medicare beneficiaries, a lot of those temporary telehealth rules were set to expire, creating a massive access cliff. The Telehealth Coverage Act of 2025 is the fix, essentially locking in the expanded access we got used to, making several key temporary telehealth flexibilities permanent under Medicare (Sec. 2).
The End of the Expiration Date
This bill’s main move is eliminating the expiration date for several critical telehealth provisions. For people who live in rural areas, have mobility issues, or just can’t take time off work for a 15-minute check-in, this is huge. Most importantly, it permanently allows Medicare coverage for audio-only services—that means a simple phone call with your doctor can still be billed and covered, long after the public health emergency is over. This is a lifeline for folks who don't have reliable internet or the latest video chat tech (Sec. 2).
It also strikes down the old requirement for mandatory in-person follow-up visits for things like monthly home dialysis checks, stroke recovery services, and mental health/substance use disorder counseling. If you’re managing a chronic condition, this means fewer trips to the clinic and more flexibility in your schedule. For someone who needs weekly therapy, being able to rely on a permanent telehealth option—without a surprise in-person mandate popping up—is a massive boost to continuity of care (Sec. 2).
Hospital Care and Hospice Recertification
Remember ‘hospital at home’ programs, where hospitals could provide acute care services right in your house? The flexibility that allowed this was set to expire in March 2025. This bill removes that fixed date, ensuring these programs can continue until after the current national public health emergency officially ends (Sec. 4). This protects a vital option for patients who need hospital-level care but would recover better in their own environment.
On the administrative side, the bill permanently allows hospice providers to use telehealth for the required face-to-face encounter when recertifying a patient’s eligibility for hospice care. This is a convenience win, but it comes with a catch: if a hospice provider is already under enhanced government oversight, they can’t use the telehealth option for recertification. This is the government’s way of saying, ‘We trust remote care, but only if you’ve proven you can handle the basics in person’ (Sec. 2).
Equity and Access for Non-English Speakers
One of the most practical changes addresses a huge gap in virtual care: language access. The Secretary of Health and Human Services must now issue new guidance within a year on how to effectively provide telehealth services to people with Limited English Proficiency (LEP) (Sec. 5). This guidance will cover everything from how to seamlessly integrate interpreters into a video call to making sure patient portals and appointment reminders are available in multiple languages. For the millions of Americans whose first language isn't English, this provision is essential to ensuring permanent telehealth access doesn’t become a permanent barrier.
New Programs and Paperwork
The bill also expands access to two specific rehabilitation programs. First, it permanently allows cardiopulmonary rehabilitation services to be covered by Medicare when delivered via real-time video technology right in a patient’s home (Sec. 6). Second, it opens up the Medicare Diabetes Prevention Program (MDPP) to fully online suppliers, meaning you can join a virtual program—live or recorded—to manage your diabetes risk, even if the provider is in a different state (Sec. 7).
However, providers should note the new administrative requirements coming down the pike. By January 1, 2026, the Secretary must establish new modifier requirements for claims. These codes will tag two specific scenarios: when a doctor uses a contracted virtual platform, and when services are billed ‘incident to’ a professional service via telehealth (Sec. 2). While this is intended to help Medicare track how services are delivered, it means new paperwork and compliance training for every practice that bills Medicare.