Wiki 29846?

RebeccaMoney

Expert
Messages
266
Location
LEES SUMMIT, MO
Best answers
0
Description of Procedure:..The wrist joint was inspected and probed with a 4U portal. Grade IV chondromalacia was noted throughout the wrist with tearing of the TFCC , through the 4U portal a 3.0 shaver was used to debride the TFCC and the synovium. An intraarticular electrocautery wand was used to further treat this. Excellent positioning was noted. The arthroscopy tower was removed.
Would this be 29846? Does repair/excision need to be done or can debridement only be done to use 29846? I was also looking at 29844. Can anyone help with this?
Thank you,
 
It's 29846, the key is the (and/or) in the description. It doesn't have to be all of it, it has to be one or more of the procedures in the description. It's not a partial synovectomy alone (29844). I haven't seen 29844 done very often, it's more common to see 29846. Was there any more to the op note description? Did the provider indicate anything else done with the chondromalacia?

Arthroscopy, wrist, surgical;
excision TFCC
and/or repair TFCC
and/or debridement joint

Do you have an encoder with lay descriptions of procedures? That would help a lot to compare the report with that.
 
It's 29846, the key is the (and/or) in the description. It doesn't have to be all of it, it has to be one or more of the procedures in the description. It's not a partial synovectomy alone (29844). I haven't seen 29844 done very often, it's more common to see 29846. Was there any more to the op note description? Did the provider indicate anything else done with the chondromalacia?

Arthroscopy, wrist, surgical;
excision TFCC
and/or repair TFCC
and/or debridement joint

Do you have an encoder with lay descriptions of procedures? That would help a lot to compare the report with that.
Nothing else in the op note about treating the chondromalacia. Yes, I do have encoder. I was interpreting Encoder description of 29846 to show a repair and/or a debridement. I was thinking a repair had to be done to use the code and that was why I was a little confused. Thank you,
 
Top