mindyanna
Networker
Hi,
I need some opinions and or assistance on this scenerio I'm about to give. Our doctor did a knee fusion (27580) and used a temporary external fixator to assist in stabilizing the bones while they reamed the bone for the fusion rod. In the AAOS book it states that Internal or External fixation is considered bundled into the fusion code. The way I'm interpretting this is that you would not be able to bill any additional internal fixation or external fixation when using the fusion code. I have other coders who think that it means either or but not both. You can't bill for an ex-fix you will be taking off at the end of the case but the situation is whether to use a modifier 22 with the fusion code to represent the additional time and so on. My concern is that if I'm interpretting the AAOS book correctly then it would be wrong to bill out the additional time it took to use something that would be considered bundled anyway. Your thoughts are greatly appreicated! Thanks
I need some opinions and or assistance on this scenerio I'm about to give. Our doctor did a knee fusion (27580) and used a temporary external fixator to assist in stabilizing the bones while they reamed the bone for the fusion rod. In the AAOS book it states that Internal or External fixation is considered bundled into the fusion code. The way I'm interpretting this is that you would not be able to bill any additional internal fixation or external fixation when using the fusion code. I have other coders who think that it means either or but not both. You can't bill for an ex-fix you will be taking off at the end of the case but the situation is whether to use a modifier 22 with the fusion code to represent the additional time and so on. My concern is that if I'm interpretting the AAOS book correctly then it would be wrong to bill out the additional time it took to use something that would be considered bundled anyway. Your thoughts are greatly appreicated! Thanks