New clinical guidelines for malnutrition could help alleviate compliance challenges associated with coding the condition, which has never had universally accepted clinical criteria.
Depending on the demographics of the region a hospital serves, its coders could determine code assignment for hundreds of deliveries and pregnancy-related services annually — reviewing coding guidelines is helpful.
The Medicaid RAC program kicked off January 1, and experts say that although the program got off to a slow start, activity will likely ramp up in the next few months.
Coding for spinal arthrodesis procedures has always been a challenge given the complexity of these detailed surgeries. Coding them in ICD-10-PCS adds several elements that must be taken into consideration when looking to apply the proper code or codes.
Sometimes people do their homework with setting up a new system, and sometimes they don't. Sometimes they do their homework, but not enough of it, and billions of dollars of wasteful spending occurs that could be avoided. But "they" won't listen.
It's great, identifying opportunities to teach. Whenever I do medical record audits, I always look for chances to educate coders, physicians, and/or CDI specialists about areas of misunderstanding by coding professionals or elements of patient experience that require specific documentation for proper code assignment.
