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Ophthalmology and Optometry Coding Alert

Reader Question:

Strabismus Surgery

Published on Mon Dec 24, 2012

Question: When filing for strabismus surgery, what is the proper way to code when the procedure is done on both eyes? Should we use modifier -50? One or two units?

Anonymous Michigan Subscriber

Answer: The proper way to code for strabismus surgery done on both eyes for most Medicare carriers is to bill the procedure code, the modifier -50 (bilateral procedure), and a 1 in the units field.

For example, the ophthalmologist performs strabismus surgery on two horizontal muscles one in the left eye and one in the right eye. There is a common billing error made with this scenario, and that is to bill 67312. Here is the difference: 67311 is for strabismus surgery, recession or resection procedure; one horizontal muscle, while 67312 is for strabismus surgery, recession or resection procedure; two horizontal muscles. Billers who use 67312 when [...]
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