ED Coding and Reimbursement Alert

Question: Are gastritis and gastrointestinal bleeding in a final diagnosis coded individually or as gastritis with hemorrhage?

Camille Villanueva
Fort Myers, Fla.

Answer: You would code gastritis with the fifth digit that represents with hemorrhage, ICD-9 code 535.01. You would use 535.00 for without hemorrhage.


Sources for You Be the Coder and Reader Questions are Penny Lodes, CPC, independent coding consultant in Appleton, Wis.; Michael Granovsky, MD, chief financial officer of Greater Washington Emergency Physicians, a five-physician group staffing a 24,000-visit ED in Maryland.; Jan Loomis, director of coding and documentation at Team Health West in Pleasanton, Calif.; Linda Jackson, CCS, CPC, Medicare Consultant at Iowa Veterans Home in Marshall Town, Iowa; Charlene Endre-Day, CMA, CMM, CPC, director of professional relations team physicians of Arizona Emergency Physicians in Phoenix; Robert La Fleur, MD, FACEP, president, Medical Management Specialists in Grand Rapids, Mich.; Caral Edelberg, CPC, CCS-P, president of Medical Management Resources Inc., an ED coding consulting firm in Jacksonville, Fla.; and John Turner, MD, PhD, medical director for documentation and coding of healthcare financial services at TeamHealth, an ED staffing firm in Knoxville, Tenn.