Talk Ten Tuesdays

In a move towards greater specificity, the nation’s healthcare providers have a new ICD-10-CM code category: Code W44.

Having gone into effect October 2023, the new code category (foreign body entering into or through a natural orifice) is seen as enhancing specificity, although Code W45 had already existed for foreign bodies entering through the skin.

During the next live edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays, Gina Yacovelli, DHSc, associated with Coding & Billing Solutions, will report on how and why pediatricians are the most likely provider group to benefit from the increased detail, while noting that the greater level of specificity will be helpful to all providers when such encounters arise.

The live broadcast will also feature these other recognizable segments:

• Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

• Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH).

• News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

• TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.

On the horizon, looming like an ominous thunderhead, is ICD-11. But wait! There’s more: the expanding role of coding in big data, for example. The evolving healthcare IT, and how it will redefine the coding profession. All this and more is coming your way.

That’s why ICD10monitor and Talk Ten Tuesdays invited senior healthcare consultant Angela Comfort, assistant vice president of revenue integrity at Montefiore, to take you on an exclusive trip into the future of ICD-11 and health informatics during the next live edition of the long-running Talk Ten Tuesdays, produced by ICD10monitor.

The live broadcast will also feature these other recognizable segments:

• Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

• Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH).

• News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

• TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.

Code G2211 continues to be a gift disguised as something else.

As many nuances surrounding the code continue to linger, there are still some areas that are not as clear-cut as many healthcare professionals would prefer.

As a refresher, G2211 allows providers (primary care, as well as specialists) to bill for additional cognitive work effort that is not currently captured in the evaluation and management (E&M) codes typically billed for these services.

One of the gray areas surrounding G2211 is the appropriate amount and/or type of documentation that should be noted in the medical record to support billing the code. Another issue involves the specific type of condition(s) that can trigger it, and what qualifies it for a high level of complexity.

During the next live edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays, AAPC’s Leonta Williams will continue to explore these nuances and provide updates based on the latest communication(s) from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) on proper code usage – and the criteria needed to stay out of hot water.

The live broadcast will also feature these other recognizable segments:

• Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

• Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH).

• News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

• TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.

How many hospital star ratings does your facility have?

Do you know? If you don’t, you’re not alone.

Apparently, many coders and clinical documentation integrity specialists (CDISs) don’t know. But you should know. That’s why ICD10monitor and Talk Ten Tuesdays have invited Michelle Wieczorek, a registered nurse (RN) and a CDI authority, to explain what the hospital star rating means and how coders and CDISs impact those stars. Wieczorek, an independent revenue cycle consultant, will also explain how to earn back fallen stars.

The live broadcast will also feature these other instantly recognizable segments:
• Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

• Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH).

• News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

• TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc., and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.

During the next live edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays, award-winning author H. Steven Moffic, MD, considered to rank among the world’s most renowned psychiatrists, will report on what he calls “social psychoexemplaries” – the other side of what he reported two weeks ago on social psychopathologies.

Moffic, in his popular daily column in Psychiatric Times, recently mused on the notion of positive social psychiatry, writing “I have come to wonder if positive psychiatry can be expanded to positive social psychiatry, meaning to groups besides individuals. In other words, are there positive social psychiatry group characteristics?”

Learn more about how positive social psychiatry might be a part of your daily experience.

The live broadcast will also feature these other recognizable segments:

• RegWatch: Former Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) career professional Stanley Nachimson will report on the latest regulatory news coming out of Washington, D.C.

• News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

• Point of View: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will be the guest cohost, substituting for Dr. Erica Remer. Tiffany will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.

What are the “do’s” and “don’ts” for the safe handling of HCPCS code G2211, used to report payment to physicians and other qualified healthcare providers for the additional work required to adequately care for patients with serious or complex conditions? The code is now payable for the 2024 calendar year (CY).

Not only has the code quickly become enigmatic, in the lexicon of medical record coding, but it also must be handled with care – as if operating a powerful band saw.

On the surface, the code seems to be relevant and purposeful. But underneath its benign exterior is a complicated network of conditions that could thwart the best efforts of the most healthcare professionals.

That is why –- in the interests of baffled coders and clinical documentation integrity specialists (CDISs) –- ICD10monitor and Talk Ten Tuesdays have invited Ronald Hirsch, MD, the permanent (and popular) panelist on Monitor Mondays, to provide his assessment of the code, while concurrently offering his list of do’s and don’ts for its implementation, during the next live edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays.

The live broadcast will also feature these other recognizable segments:

• Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH).

• News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

• TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.

Achieving high-performing revenue cycle management (RCM) begins with understanding where your healthcare organization falls on the RCM Maturity Framework, according to Matt Bridge, senior vice president for AGS Health.

Bridge, who will be the special guest during the next upcoming edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays, says this four-stage framework informs a strategic roadmap designed for optimizing and digitally transforming revenue cycle performance and future proofing operations through a hybrid model of in-house management, globalized services, advanced technologies, and actionable analytics. Bridge will begin the first installment in his three-part series on the contemporary challenges facing revenue cycle management personnel during the popular weekly Internet radio broadcast.

The broadcast will also feature these other instantly recognizable segments:

• Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

• Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH).

• News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

• TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.

We are all familiar with DSM-5 and ICD-10 for the classification of various mental disorders. Both, but especially ICD, also cover some of the social conditions needing medical attention that may or may not be connected to the primary disorder or illness. ICD does that in the Z codes. 

However, Z codes are used infrequently. 

Moreover, many social problems harmful to individuals, groups, and countries seem resistant to elimination – think racism, sexism, ageism, antisemitism, Islamophobia, cultish thinking, and burnout. During the next live edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays, award-winning author H. Steven Moffic, MD, considered among the world’s most renowned psychiatrists, will offer a classification of what he collectively calls the “social psychopathologies” that mentally harm both perpetrators and victims – and will suggest remedies that could lead to new research and interventions.

The broadcast will also feature these other instantly recognizable segments:

•Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

•News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

•TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.  

New Condition Code 92 is here, and it’s effective now. The code outlines the billing requirement for intensive outpatient program services for hospital outpatient departments, critical access hospitals (CAHs), and community mental health centers (CMHCs). 

To explain what you need to know about correctly billing the new Condition Code 92 during the next weekly edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays will be Rose T. Dunn, past president of the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA), and currently the COO for First Class Solutions. 

But wait – there’s more. Dunn will also report on the latest news related to the electronic submission of medical documentation (esMD). Furthermore, she will report on a proposal to the appeal process so that Medicare beneficiaries could change their status from inpatient to outpatient.

All this and more will be reported during the next live edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays.

The broadcast will also feature these other instantly recognizable segments:

·Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

·Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH). 

·News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

·TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.  

Shrouded in controversy, the HCPCS code G2211 was released in 2021, proposed by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) to pay physicians and other qualified healthcare providers for the additional work required to adequately care for patients with serious or complex conditions. The code is now payable for calendar year (CY) 2024. 

The journey for this code to become payable has been fraught with obstacles. First, to financially support it, CMS slashed the conversion factor (CF). Second, CMS released the code without any true documentation guidelines on what exactly would need to be notated in the medical record to support billing. Third, some think there may be conflict between the HCPCS code and the medical decision-making (MDM) component of the Evaluation and Management (E&M) Documentation guidelines recently adopted by both CMS and the American Medical Association (AMA). 

During the next live edition of Talk Ten Tuesdays, Leonata Williams will report on some of the nuances regarding this new code. She will also provide important best practices while America’s healthcare system awaits additional guidance from CMS.
 
The live broadcast will also feature these other recognizable segments:

•Coding Report: Laurie Johnson, senior healthcare consultant with Revenue Cycle Solutions, LLC, will report on the latest coding news.

•Social Determinants of Health: Tiffany Ferguson, CEO for Phoenix Medical Management, Inc., will report on the news happening at the intersection of medical record auditing and the social determinants of health (SDoH). 

•News Desk: Timothy Powell, CPA, will anchor the Talk Ten Tuesdays News Desk.

•TalkBack: Erica Remer, MD, founder and president of Erica Remer, MD, Inc. and Talk Ten Tuesdays co-host, will report on a subject that has caught her attention during her popular segment.