Medical Billing Blog with Medical Billing & Coding Info & Articles

Our blog contains news and articles relating to numerous healthcare sectors including revenue cycle management, medical billing, medical coding, ICD, HIPAA, practice management functions and more.

The Benefits of Getting Credentialed
One thing you learn quickly when you establish your own practice is that there are many types of insurance plans as there are patients and in order to get paid for the services that your render, you must be approved or rather “credentialed” to do business with your patient through that particular insurance company. The process of getting credentialed with each insurance company is a little different as to what each carrier will require from you but each will require a lot of paperwork and following up. That’s where a third party partner can help you.If you want to get credentialed with as many different carriers as possible but you …
Office Visits And Well Checks
Any time you are coding for problem visits that a patient has, it is important that you take into consideration any other office visits that they may have recently had. Basically, you are going to want to look to see if there is a connection between visits for preventative medicine as well as current health issues that may be in place, which also needs some attention. Many times, a physician will end up seeing a patient that shows up in search of a visit to fall into the category of preventative medicine. Then, upon further evaluation, the doctor will then need to look at the patient further for some sort …
Avoiding Costly “Medically Unlikely Edit” Denials
It can happen to any individual who is involved with coding, dealing with MUEs can end up being a nightmare if you do not know when and how to use them. MUEs, which is short for the term Medically Unlikely Edits, happen to be put in place to try and help limit the amount of billing errors. The more you understand them, the better off you will be when you find that you need to use them. If you are worried about dealing with MUEs, then you really should know that you are not alone. Luckily, there are a couple of things that you can look to and keep in …
The Scoop On Foreign Body Removal
Foreign body removal is a common procedure for most practices and as such it would seem very simple and forthright to code for this service; however that’s not always the case. It is very important that you take care when processing all of your cases involving foreign body removal. Many times, if you end up mixing up a code with the wrong place, your practice could find that there will be problems down the road when trying to receive the proper amount of reimbursement. Pay close attention to the exact part of the anatomy where the service was performed as the codes for reporting FBR have become much more detailed. …
Dealing With A Chronic Condition
Finding the proper code when you’re doing the medical billing for your office can be a sticky situation when you’re presented with a medical coding situation that you have never written up before. In the event that you have this arise, it is best to break down the procedure and double check your chosen codes to make sure that you’re choosing the most current sets possible describe the services that were given to the patient, in doing so you’ll save a lot of headaches regarding declined or improper reimbursements later on down the road. When you have a perfect example of such a chronic condition that you need to code …
Questions Answered Regarding IM Injections
Do you find that you have several questions in regards to injection codes? Well, if you do then you certainly not alone! In order to determine which of the codes apply for certain injection procedures, you can use a couple of great guidelines that are sure to help you out. Perhaps you have a question on whether or not supervision plays a role in the code that you need to report. Is the physician for the patient in the office and available while the injection is going to be taking place? When the answer to this is yes, you can feel confident in reporting code 90772. A code of 9921 …
All You Should Know About Foreign Body Removal
Anyone who has been involved with coding already knows just how frustrating it can be to deal with some of the tougher cases in involving FBR, or foreign body removal. As with many of the things that you will code, this is the same in terms of the fact that each case can vary from patient to patient. For example, one patient will have a different type of removal than another and the method will also be quite different in nature. Even if they have a removal that is necessary from the same area, physicians are well known for using different methods from one another from time to time. This …
Keep Your Observation Coding In Check
There is nothing worse than finding different coding mistakes. One of the things that you can do in order to keep certain mistakes from showing up is keep your observation coding in check. Although you may think that you know all of the general rules in terms of observation services reporting in the ED, mistakes can still happen. When you are looking to smooth out any of the wrinkles found in your observation coding, you can keep several things in mind. For starters, it is very important that you do not bill more than once for physicians that are from the same group. This is a situation that calls for …
Proper Coding Procedures For A Twin Delivery
There are all sorts of different procedures that can apply to one pregnancy where twin babies are involved. Because of the nature of delivery, often times you could have an obstetrician delivering the second baby via cesarean section while the first one was able to come out alright during a vaginal birth. When the situations can be so different each and every time for various patients, it is very important that you be sure to choose the proper codes. This can be a much easier process that you may think of at first. As long as you keep all of the procedures in mind, you should end up with the …
Reporting Fourth Digit Burn Location Diagnosis
Are you finding that your coding process seems to have taken a toll in regards to burn diagnosis? After all, it is up to the coder to make the important decision of looking over the ICD-9 codes in order to choose the correct one for each specific encounter. When it seems as though there is no good way to go about this task, there are a couple of things that you can remember in order to make the process of reporting much easier for everyone involved. One thing that you will want to keep in mind when you begin is that it is important to go ahead and start by …