The new 2018 ICD-10-CM coding updates have been released and will go into effect in just a few weeks! Included in this annual release are new guidelines affecting those for pathology. Will these changes affect you and your coding? There’s not much time left to find out: You need to use these new 2018 ICD-10-CM codes for patient encounters and discharges occurring from October 1, 2017 through September 30, 2018.
Office managers, medical coders and medical billing specialists, listen up! Every coding mistake you make affects your practice’s bottom line. That’s why you need to stay on top of regulatory changes and the resulting compliance issues that will inevitably follow.
Pathology Coding Pain
Assigning diagnosis codes to the highest available level is key for any coder, but when working in the laboratory field, you need to be able to help physicians and other providers understand what information is required when ordering lab tests. Pathology coders know that the real art lies in ensuring complete documentation in the medial record when clinical lab tests are ordered and in knowing how to follow up when a lab requests further information from an ordering provider.
With all the different variables in pathology coding, it’s urgent to stay ahead of the game when new codes roll out. Yet even though new medical billing codes are released every October, these updates still manage to catch billing specialists off guard. For example, do you know where to find the new ICD-10-CM codes for 2018? Do you know how to check your ICD-10-CM 2018 code book to ensure you have the current set of guidelines? Would you believe that many coding and billing specialists don’t?!
Six Columns of Confusion and Other Coding Clarifications
Pathology coders rely on the ICD-10-CM neoplasm table which classifies neoplasms by anatomic site. Organized in six columns, it also provides six behavior categories (malignant primary, malignant secondary, in situ, benign, uncertain behavior and unspecified behavior) from which to select the proper code.
If you find yourself in a pathology coding fog, you’re not alone. Understanding the six columns of the neoplasm table can be daunting at times, especially for those who don’t work with the table every day. Do you know what the tissue diagnosis CA in situ means? You can’t afford to guess. Learning what the new codes are and when you need to use them, as well as understanding old rules, is a must for you to assign the proper pathology codes and receive the correct reimbursement.
Bottom line: Selecting an incorrect code can have big-time negative implications on your practice’s bottom line.
Learn to Decode the Neoplasm Table
Expert speaker Jill Young addresses all of these issues in an audio conference for ProfEdOnDemand, “2018 ICD-10-CM Pathology Updates: Understand the Neoplasm Table.” In this session, Jill offers simple, clear-cut explanations for each of the six neoplasm table columns and explains situations indicating when you can use the unspecified vs. uncertain column. She also offers explanations and examples of coding off a pathology report and explores the new diagnosis pathology codes for 2018.
