Cardiology Coding Alert

Illinois Subscriber

Answer: You should be able to report 93270 (Wearable patient activated electrocardiographic rhythm derived event recording with presymptom memory loop, 24-hour attended monitoring, per 30-day period of time; recording [includes connection, recording, and disconnection]) in the situation you describe, assuming you meet certain conditions.

According to CPT Assistant (August 2010), you should check for the following before reporting 93270:

The patient received the monitor from the office or facility, or via mail, such as from a monitoring center. The physician or facility instructed the patient on proper monitor use (including hookup, recording, and transmission).

The patient sent at least one transmission. Reason: Patients must send a test transmission when the monitoring period begins to be sure the device is working.

Lesson learned: When the patient (1) receives both the device and instructions in the mail AND (2) the physician or facility staff never instructed the patient directly, you should not report 93270, CPT Assistant indicates.

You also should not report 93270 if the patient sends no transmissions. "If no tracing is sent, then there can be no report and no reportable service has been provided even though the patient received a monitor for a month," CPT Assistant states.