Hospitalists performing pre- and post op care for surgeons

[acw]

There are surgeons at the hospital that I work for that want the hospitalists to perform all their pre-op physicials and perform all their post-operative care while the patient is in the hospital (manage pain, etc...). The surgeon would only do the surgery while patient is in the hospital. I know that in order to bill for post op management, the hospitalists would need to use the surgery CPT code that the surgeon is billing, and I would add -55 modifier to this code and also add date range of service. I also understand that if the hospitalists perform the pre-op physicial within 24-48 hours of surgery, I can add -56 modifier to the surgery code.

Are there any Coders doing this? I think there would have to be close communication with surgeon coders in order to do this process.

Annette Willson, CPC, CEMC