Thank you for inquiring about CMS0002v15 (Preventive Care and Screening: Screening for Depression and Follow-Up Plan). The measure requires only one depression screening to be completed annually, and if positive, an appropriate follow-up action be documented. If multiple screenings are completed during the measurement period, the most recent one (done last) is used. In your scenario, if no other qualifying encounters occurred after March, and the follow-up was documented within 2 days of the January qualifying encounter, the patient will have met the numerator requirements since the screening from the January encounter is considered “Most Recent".

I work in a hospital quality department. We have a specific question about the CMS-2 measure (Screening for Depression and Follow Up Plan). Specifically, we are looking to understand if the measure is considered "met" if a patient is screened at any single qualifying encounter during the measurement period, or if the screening must occur at the most recent qualifying encounter. For example: A 19-year-old patient has a qualifying encounter in January 2026, where he receive a PHQ-9 score of 8 and a follow-up plan is documented. The same patient has another qualifying encounter in March 2026 but is not screened at that time. In this scenario, is the measure considered met based on the January encounter, or does the lack of screening in March result in the patient falling out of the measure?