Sean McSweeney, founder and president of Apache Health, a Los-Angeles based medical billing company, gave three helpful tips for orthopedic surgery coding.
1. Pay very close attention to the anatomic details while coding an op report to ensure that every billable portion of the report gets captured and thereby yields the maximum possible reimbursement.
2. Know the application and differences of the -51 vs. -59 modifier.
3. ICD-10 specificity and laterality are everything. Unspecified no longer flies.