Up And Close With Interventional Coding Updates

By Author: Julia Rose
Total Articles: 89
Comment this article

Interventional coding is very challenging specialty and there's an acute shortage of expert professionals who understand the complexity of the medical procedures involved. The key to gain the required accuracy is getting interventional coding updates at the right time, which means you have to be on the lookout for updates all the - time. Better still, you can attend conferences on interventional coding which will be worth the time and energy you spend. The biggest advantage is you can meet the industry leaders and expert professionals who can clear your doubts in a flash.


Getting the interventional coding updates on time is as close you can come to maintaining accuracy with the codes, and avoid any compliance issue or denials. There are around 300,000 changes and 4,305 new bundles affecting Part B providers effective July 1, 2008. For example, CCI now bundles 36555-36556 (Insertion of central venous access device) into 93503 (Swan-Ganz ...
... insertion), but you can append a modifier to the pair to break the edit. Anesthesiologists reporting these two procedures together will need to make certain they are documenting the location of the CVP and Swan Ganz, and they must be clearly separate to allow a 59 modifier to release the edit. In addition to adding and deleting code bundles, CCI also uses its updates to announce whether you can append modifiers to separate bundling edits.


The use of modifiers in interventional coding also makes things a lot difficult, and the way you use them creates the difference in your claims. Using multiple procedures on the same date is also a little tricky, and can attract denials. However, make essential the use correct modifier in a situation like this to your strategy to stay away from denials. The latest interventional coding updates also include changes to modifiers in cardiovascular surgery, spine, evaluation and management, and radiology.


We also provide medical billing and medical coding audio conferences with premier coding experts, CDs, tapes and transcripts of coding training information by specialty.