Don’t Be Stumped by This Bumpy Visit
Question: I have an pediatrician that wants to charge for the evaluation and management (E/M) visit as well as the wart removal for an 8-year-old patient who was brought in by their parent. My thought is that if the visit is only for the destruction of the warts, then you cannot charge for the office visit. Am I correct in this? AAPC Forum Participant Answer: The answer will depend on the encounter scenario. For instance, suppose an established patient was brought into the office by their parent and the patient or parent mentions three warts on their finger they need removed. The practitioner agrees, removing them with salicylic acid during that visit, while performing no other work during the encounter. In this scenario, you would report 17110 (Destruction (eg, laser surgery, electrosurgery, cryosurgery, chemosurgery, surgical curettement), of benign lesions other than skin tags or cutaneous vascular proliferative lesions; up to 14 lesions). If that was in fact the only work performed during the encounter, you would not apply an E/M code to the visit. If, however, other work was done during the visit, like the patient was complaining of a fever or the warts were found during the patient’s well-child visit, then an E/M code would be appropriate. Lindsey Bush, BA, MA, CPC, Production Editor, AAPC
