Home Health ICD-9/ICD-10 Alert

Published on Mon Aug 22, 2011 PDF

More codes don't make pressure ulcer coding more complicated.

In ICD-9, to code for a pressure ulcer, you choose from one of 9 different location codes, ranging from 707.00 to 707.09. You must pair the location code with one of the six pressure ulcer stage codes in the 707.2x (Pressure ulcer stage) range.

ICD-10 difference: Come 2013 when you start using ICD-10, you'll have 149 different pressure ulcer codes from which to choose. The ICD-10 pressure ulcer codes range from L89.000 to L89.95-. The fourth digit of each code indicates the general location of the pressure ulcer, the fifth digit further specifies the location, and the sixth digit indicates the stage or whether the ulcer is unstageable or of an unspecified stage.

Bonus: ICD-10 improves upon ICD-9 by offering laterality. With ICD-9, there's no clear way to indicate that your patient has a stage 2 pressure ulcer on his right buttock and a stage 2 pressure ulcer on his left buttock. You can only report code pair 707.05 (Pressure ulcer; buttock) and 707.22 (Pressure ulcer; stage II) once.

With ICD-10, you can list both L89.312 (Pressure ulcer of right buttock, stage II) and L89.322 (Pressure ulcer of left buttock, stage II) to better specify your patient's condition.