Medical Coding For Interventional Radiology

Accurate healthcare coding is vital inside of a complete billing cycle. It ought to be handled with utmost treatment to make sure maximum reimbursement to the medical professional. For the medical specialty such as interventional radiology, the coding is very challenging with varied analysis and therapy check this out  techniques, specifically with regards to radiologic supervision and interpretation (S&I). Interventional radiology comprises quite a few methods these as percutaneous nephrostomy, aspirations and biopsies and the team handling it should be complete with all the applicable codes and payer regulations.

Reporting Interventional Radiology Codes

Key documentation for interventional radiology include catheter insertion point, catheter end position, vessels catheterized, vessels visualized and abnormal anatomy. The catheterization codes have for being selected based on the access site; multiple access sites and their catheterizations have to get reported separately. The professional medical coder must be familiar with the selective and non-selective arterial and venous catheterization codes and the relevant catheterization rules.

Let us consider an example to understand how distinct methods in interventional radiology are coded correctly. First of all they need to know the proper location, type of device (internal/external), intent (diagnostic or intervention), technique (endoscopy or percutaneous) and the components that can be coded.

Consider a patient who has been brought back for the practice a few days after placement of percutaneous nephrostomy. Contrast is injected to the tube, and test says that the hydronephrosis has not resolved. The doctor removes the tube over a guidewire and replaces a ureteral stent for it. The tube is not reinserted.

The correct CPT codes for this course of action are:

50394, 74425, with the nephrostogram 50393, 74480, for placement of the ureteral stent

In a very slightly different context, when the only difference is that a new nephrostomy tube is inserted, it should be as follows.

50394, 74425, nephrostogram 50393, 74480, placement of ureteral stent 50398-59, 75984, nephrostomy catheter change

When it comes to marrow aspirations and biopsies, there can be similar confusions. It ought to be reported 38220 when only a bone marrow aspiration is performed. Use 38221 when only a bone marrow biopsy is performed. But it can be reported this way only when they are performed at different sites. When performed at the same site through the same skin incision, HCPCS G0364 has to generally be used.

Effective Specialty-specific Coding for Interventional Radiology

A health care coding company with long term experience and many clients to serve will have a special team of experts for each medical specialty to ensure correct diagnostic and procedural codes.

Interventional radiology professional medical coding services provided by this kind of a company include:

Hospital/inpatient services Timely audits DRG/ICD-9-CM validations ASCs - Ambulatory Surgical Centers Coding Emergency room e-code evaluation Payer specific service CPT and ICD-9 based on AMA and CMS guidelines