Aochoa3
New
One of my providers loves to use Allergic Rhinitis, Allergic Conjunctivitis, Acute pharyngitis, and Acute Sinusitis. Is there a code that covers it all? I work at a clinic where the provider codes and we just review it before locked.
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Wiki Too many codes!
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danskangel313
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There's no combination code for all of these conditions. In the absence of specific documentation, one issue is the possibility of overlapping symptoms.
Regarding the pharyngitis, sinusitis can cause coughing, congestion and postnasal drip, which could potentially cause the sore throat. In such a case, the sore throat would be a symptom of the sinusitis and not coded separately. The sore throat/inflammation would have to exist on its own and not be a symptom of any other condition to be coded separately. I don't know how one would prove that it wasn't related to the sinusitis.
Also, if a patient presents with a runny nose, congestion, sneezing, etc, I'm not sure how one would conclude that the patient has both acute sinusitis and allergic rhinitis, unless the documentation explains it.
There's nothing to say the provider can't code for all of these conditions, however, taken at face value, it is somewhat questionable that a patient would get diagnosed with all of them during one encounter. However, without documentation to go off of, there's really no direction to give you about it.