Wiki accessory tragus excision

[Jamie Dezenzo]

Hello all and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Op reads:

"ellipitical incision was made around lesion blunt sharp dissection carried through skin and subq tissue. It appeared to be an elongated area of cartilage which dove down towards the parotid but did not seem to go through the parotid tissue. It was excised and then closed."
Path: accessory tragus 744.1

1144X CPT code?

Thanks!!!!!!!!

 

[coderguy1939]

I'm not exactly sure where the surgeon is making the incision, but 69110 may be another possibility.

 

[elenax]

Both codes looks good to me but me personally I lean towards 11440...

 

[Kelly_Josephine]

I am struggling with this excision scenario also.

I coded 11440 and 11440-59 (Excision, other benign lesion including margins, except skin tag (unless listed elsewhere), face, ears, eyelids, nose, lips, mucous membrane; excised diameter 0.5 cm or less) because there were closures made for excisions of two accessory auricles.

An internal audit came back with alternate/preferred choice of 11200 (Removal of skin tags, multiple fibrocutaneous tags, any area; up to and including 15 lesions) but no citation.

I thought that an accessory auricle Q17.0 was not a true skin tag. Also, I thought that 11200 was relevant when no closure, repair, sutures are made. In any event, I can not find any definitive source to confirm either coding scenario.

I would really like to get to the bottom of this, although I do not have access to CPT Assistant to see if they ever covered this question. I see several threads on this query but no resolution. Another suggested codes include 69110 (Excision external ear; partial, simple repair), which seems feasible as well. I have tried online searching "accessory auricle auricular tragus preauricular skin tag excision removal Q17.0 744 11440 11200 69100" in every possible combination and am stuck.