Pediatric Coding Alert

Question: A 7-year-old patient was seen for conjunctivitis, or “pink eye,” in our office recently. The pediatrician failed to note what type of conjunctivitis this was, however. How should I choose the diagnosis code?

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Answer: You will first need more information from your practitioner, so you will need to begin by querying them. It’s important to find out if the cause of the conjunctivitis was viral, bacterial, or allergic. Once you have the source of the pink eye, you can then choose from the following lists below for the appropriate diagnosis code:

Refer to the B30.- Codes for Viral Conjunctivitis

• B30.0 (Keratoconjunctivitis due to adenovirus)
• B30.1 (Conjunctivitis due to adenovirus)
• B30.2 (Viral pharyngoconjunctivitis)
• B30.3 (Acute epidemic hemorrhagic conjunctivitis (enteroviral))
• B30.8 (Other viral conjunctivitis)
• B30.9 (Viral conjunctivitis, unspecified)

Use the H10.- Codes for Bacterial or Allergic Conjunctivitis

• H10.0- (Mucopurulent conjunctivitis)
• H10.1- (Acute atopic conjunctivitis)
• H10.2- (Other acute conjunctivitis)
• H10.3- (Unspecified acute conjunctivitis)
• H10.4- (Chronic conjunctivitis)
• H10.5- (Blepharoconjunctivitis)
• H10.8- (Other conjunctivitis)
• H10.9 (Unspecified conjunctivitis).

Lindsey Bush, BA, MA, CPC, Production Editor, AAPC