Wiki Removal of sternal wires

[dvance4210]

Patient had CABG two months ago. Having chest wall pain across both breasts since surgery. States that she has a possible metal allergy and wants to have sternal wires removed.
"We made approximately a 5 cm incision..exploring the bone to make sure that it was well healed. In the area of the incision, there was a small amount of pus which we cultured. We resected the area of the stitch abscess back to the healthy tissue. We removed all of the sternal wires, taking care at each step of the procedure to make sure that the bone in all areas were well healed. There were no signs of gross infection or osteomyelitis..."

I have had many suggestions on the coding of this, some say to code as a sternal debridement (21627), or just code as a sternotomy (39010).

Does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks,
Dorinda

 

[Michelle Thompson]

For the removal of the sternal wire look at codes 20670, 20680 - and for the debridement look at codes 11042,11043, or 11044. I hope this helps.