Look to Status to Determine POS
Question: One of our providers is a surgeon who sometimes gets called to the hospital or emergency department (ED) to see patients. For example, the provider may get called to the ED to see a patient with rectal pain who is diagnosed with a perirectal abscess. The surgeon then drained the abscess at the patient’s bedside in the ED. I sometimes get denials when reporting those encounters and services, I think because I’m a little confused about what to report for place of service (POS). How do I know what to report for POS when a provider and patient interact in more than one place? Indiana Subscriber Answer: The most important thing to remember when selecting POS is that you’re coding according to the patient’s status, which may or not be the same as the patient’s physical location. For example, if a patient goes to the ED and has been admitted into the hospital as an inpatient but is not yet assigned a room, then the patient’s status would be considered inpatient, even if they were physically in the ED during part of an encounter. Rachel Dorrell, MA, MS, CPC-A, CPPM, Development Editor, AAPC
