EM Coding Alert
Reduce Coding Headaches by Knowing Chronic Migraine Symptoms
Experts: You have to know which migraines qualify as chronic to code correctly.
Any medical office that performs E/M service could end up treating a patient suffering from chronic migraine headaches.
Challenge: Figuring out whether a patient has a chronic migraine (G43.7-, Chronic migraine without aura) gets confusing quickly, as there are some very specific targets that the patient’s condition must hit before you can report attach a chronic migraine code to an E/M to prove medical necessity for the service.
Solution: Check out this list of indicators for chronic migraines from Yvonne Bouvier, CPC, CEDC, senior coding analyst for Bill Dunbar and Associates, LLC, in Indianapolis, Ind.
CHRONIC MIGRAINE SYMPTOMS
Chronic migraines occur 15 or more days in a month within at least a three-month span without medication overuse (per the Mayo clinic and the International Headache Society).
In addition, chronic migraine sufferers must have experienced two or more of the following symptoms eight or more days per month for at least three months:
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