If your utilization review (UR) committee is like many others nationwide, it may not have actually met in years-and chances are your UR committee members are secretly glad that's the case. Let's face it; those meetings can be a complete snooze.
In this month's issue, our coding experts answer questions about how to differentiate between modifiers -52, -73, -74, coding for negative pressure wound therapy, and billing the technical component of pathology services.
A surgeon performs a diagnostic shoulder arthroscopy before repairing a patient’s rotator cuff. The surgeon knew ahead of time that he or she would be repairing the rotator cuff. Should a coder or biller append modifier -59 (distinct procedural service) to the CPT® code for the diagnostic shoulder arthroscopy to ensure reimbursement for both procedures?
Coders can run into two types of edits that may require them to append modifier -59 (distinct procedural service) to override: NCCI edits and medically unlikely edits (MUE).
Coding for physician services doesn’t always match coding for facility services, which can cause problems for coders who code records for both. ED E/M is one area where different rules come into play.
