Oncology & Hematology Coding Alert

Hepatocellular carcinomas and hepatoblastomas split paths under ICD-10.When you start using ICD-10 in 2013, you'll have to leave your 155.0 comfort zone and start using more specific codes for primary liver neoplasms.ICD-9: A number of diagnoses fall under the ICD-9 code you currently use:155.0, Malignant neoplasm of liver primary Carcinoma: liver, specified as primary hepatocellular liver cell HepatoblastomaICD-10: The new code set does not provide a one-to-one corresponding code. Instead, you'll need to choose from a number of possibilities:C22.0, Liver cell carcinoma Hepatocellular carcinoma HepatomaC22.2, Hepatoblastoma C22.3, Angiosarcoma of liver Kupffer cell sarcoma C22.4, Other sarcomas of liver C22.7, Other specified carcinomas of liver C22.8, Malignant neoplasm of liver, primary, unspecified as to type.Documentation: If your practice's current documentation format doesn't allow quick access to whether the patient's diagnosis is hepatoma rather than hepatoblastoma or angiosarcoma, add the C22.- diagnoses to your provider education and clinical documentation improvement strategy in [...]