Some facilities plan to use both CPT ® and ICD-10-PCS to code procedures after implementation. Kristi Stanton, RHIT, CCS, CPC, CIRCC, and Angie Comfort, RHIT, CDIP, CCS, discuss the advantages and challenges of this strategy, and how to implement it.
In January, I wrote about the perfect storm that led to the release of the 2014 OPPS final rule. We endured a later-than-usual release, errors in the data files and a release of updated files, a government shutdown, and a vastly shortened window between the release of the final rule and implementation on January 1. Judging by the confusion among providers?and corrections and clarifications coming from CMS on what seems like a weekly basis on a wide range of issues?we're still not in the clear.
Congress needed just a week to throw a huge monkey wrench into the healthcare industry's plans for ICD-10 implementation. On March 26, House leadership introduced H.R. 4302, "Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014." By April 1, the bill had passed the Senate and been signed into law by President Obama.
Providers struggle to reconcile conflicts between recent CMS regulations and the CPT® Manual and other AMA publications. Jugna Shah, MPH , Valerie A. Rinkle, MPA , and Linda S. Dietz, RHIA, CCS, CCS-P , look at specific areas of confusion and how to code them accurately.
Cheryl Ericson, MS, RN, CCDS, CDIP, discusses the difference between “after study” and “due to” when it comes to choosing the correct principal diagnosis .
While many of the code changes in the 2014 CPT® Manual surgical sections involve bundling together common procedures, the major changes in the Radiology and Laboratory sections involve updates for newly recognized technologies and drugs.
ICD-10-CM provides many more combination codes for drug- and alcohol-related diagnoses than ICD-9-CM. Shelley C. Safian, PhD, CCS-P, CPC-H, CPC-I, explains how this could actually result in less work for coders.
Changes implemented by the 2014 OPPS Final Rule resulted in the addition and deletion of many codes in the January I/OCE update. Dave Fee, MBA , reviews some of the most important modifications, including changes to evaluation and management services and device reporting.
