Anesthesia Coding Alert

Know how many extra units you can claim for each situation. Although not every payer will add to your reimbursement for physical status modifiers, they’re good for tracking purposes and help show why your anesthesia providers might spend longer on a case than expected. The trick is knowing how to distinguish one level from another, because the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) doesn’t fully define the terms. Instead, their use is based on clinical decisions the anesthesia provider makes for each patient. Providers assign a physical status modifier during the pre-anesthesia assessment. Keep these examples in mind as a way to gauge your own cases: P1 (A normal healthy patient) is generally a healthy patient who presents with minimal risks. P2 (A patient with mild systemic disease) applies to patients with conditions such as controlled diabetes. P3 (A patient with severe systemic disease) points to conditions such as severe diabetes with vascular complications, stable [...]