tci General Surgery Coding Alert - 2019 Issue 5

Reader Question: Think ‘A’ for ‘Active’ Encounter

Question: Our surgeon removed sutures from a patient new to our practice who had a right-thigh laceration (no foreign body) treated in an emergency room by a different physician. Should we use the ICD-10-CM seventh character that indicates this is an initial encounter? SuperCoder Subscriber Answer: Although this patient is new to your practice, the diagnosis code should reflect that this is a subsequent encounter. The confusion over the way to apply seventh characters A (Initial encounter), D (Subsequent encounter), or S (Sequela) to a code from the Injury, Poisoning, and Certain Other Consequences of External Causes (S00-T88) chapter...

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