The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) uses a fee schedule to pay physicians and nonphysician practitioners for their professional services. For many surgeries and other types of procedures, Medicare's payment for the procedure includes post-operative visits delivered during a global period of ten or 90 days anchored on the surgery date. The Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015 requires CMS gather the necessary data to appropriately value post-operative care. The law requires CMS to collect data on the "number and level" of visits in the global period from a representative sample of physicians beginning January 1, 2017. Congress suggested, but does not require, that the data be collected through claims.