Are we saying that some doctors will fraudulently code services because otherwise Medicare wouldn't pay for them?
Maybe. An awful lot of people here report getting annual physicals paid for by Medicare, even though annual physicals aren't covered by Medicare. And if people ask here why their annual physical wasn't covered, they're told it's because it was improperly coded, when there's no code for a routine physical exam because it's never covered.
Something must be going on to get Medicare to pay for these annual physicals. Maybe it's the patient complaining to the doctor's office, and the doctor's office changing the coding to a wellness visit even though what was actually performed was an annual physical. Fraud is a strong word, but possibly applicable.
Or maybe what someone here is calling an annual physical isn't actually an annual preventive physical, but instead a visit for an existing condition, like the example
CardsFan gave about visits related to monitoring maintenance drugs for high blood pressure or high cholesterol. They're covered.
But the OP in this thread asked why his wife's "annual check up" wasn't covered, and that sounds like an actual physical exam, preventive in nature, and not just the "wellness" questions that are part of a wellness visit or welcome to Medicare visit. And someone responded that it was probably coded wrong, which I doubt is the case, but don't know for sure because the OP never came back and clarified what services were performed during that visit.
Someone else complained that even though he'd ask for an annual wellness exam, his doctor would code it as a physical. What's not clear, again, is what the doctor did during the visit, because it's possible it really was an annual physical exam and not a wellness exam (as defined by Medicare). If that were the case, the doctor wasn't coding it improperly; it may not match what the poster asked for, but I think what matters is what is actually done during the visit.