tci ED Coding & Reimbursement Alert - 2013 Issue 3

Reader Question: 3-Plus Trigger Point Shots Alter Code Choice

Question: A patient suffers whiplash from crashing his car into a parked vehicle, and the ED physician performs trigger point injections to four sites to treat the condition. I reported 20552x2 and get a denial for the second code. Why? The descriptor for 20552 states "one or two muscle[s]," so I thought four muscles meant reporting the code twice.Illinois Subscriber Answer: You are in the right code set, you just picked the wrong trigger-point injection code. While you should use 20552 (Injection[s]; single or multiple trigger point[s], one or two muscle[s]) for one or two shots, the...

To read the full article, sign in and subscribe to tci ED Coding & Reimbursement Alert.

Thank you for choosing Find-A-Code, please Sign In to remove ads.