Medicare Compliance & Reimbursement

Even if CCI doesn't publish edits bundling two procedures together, your practice should know which are separately billable. Myth: If the Correct Coding Initiative (CCI) doesn't bundle two procedures, then you are always free to report them together. Reality: The CCI edits don't address every potential coding situation -- you must report only the applicable and most accurate code(s) for your physician's documentation, experts say. Turn To Your CCI Manual "The CCI manual (in its introduction) specifically acknowledges that edits were not created to address every situation involving improper unbundling, but that this fact does not absolve the practice from coding a service correctly (applying the standard bundling/unbundling principles) when submitting codes," says Seth Canterbury, CPC, ACS-EM, education specialist with the University of Florida Jacksonville Physicians, Inc. According to the CCI manual, "The edits and policies do not include all possible combinations of correct coding edits or types of unbundling that [...]