News

High-Quality Diet in Pregnancy is Associated with a Lower Risk of Fetal Growth Restriction

Washington, DC ― Research has shown that an unhealthy diet during pregnancy can have long-term effects on a child’s health. Now, in a new study to be presented today at the Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine’s (SMFM) annual meeting, The Pregnancy Meeting™, which is being held... Continue Reading

Chewing Sugar-Free Gum Reduced Preterm Births

Washington, DC ― Each year, an estimated 15 million babies are born prematurely or preterm (defined as delivery before the 37th week of pregnancy), and this number is rising, according to the World Health Organization. Preterm babies are at greater risk of experiencing serious health... Continue Reading

Identifying Trimester Coding in ICD-10 - Replaces previous tip from 2015

In ICD-10 trimester-based coding is utilized to identify the trimester during the encounter. Instructions about obstetric trimester-based billing is found in Chapter 15. The CMS and the NCHS (within the US Federal Government’s DHHS) provides these instructions in their ICD-10 CM manual. ... Continue Reading

Care Coordination and Interprofessional Consultations

The Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) Coding Committee; Steve Rad, MD; Amie Hollard, MD; Betzaida Martinez, CPCP, CPMA, COBGC, CPPM; Vanita Jain, MD MFM subspecialists frequently need to speak with other physicians for patient care coordination and/or are asked by other physicians to... Continue Reading

Coding for Remote Patient Monitoring Services – An Update

The Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) Coding Committee; Steve Rad, MD; Trisha Malisch, CCS-P, CPC; Brian Iriye MD; Irina Rubina, CPC; Vanita Jain, MD. PURPOSE: Updated information and new coding guidance regarding remote patient monitoring (RPM) In the era of the current COVID-19... Continue Reading

Utilizing E/M CPT Code 99211 when performing COVID testing

The Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) Coding Committee; Vanita Jain, MD; Steve Rad, MD; Dave Smith, CPC, MBA; Trisha Malisch, CCS-P, CPC; Fadi Bsat, MD. The SMFM Coding Committee has previously provided guidance regarding E/M encounters in the era of the COVID-19 pandemic... Continue Reading

Interim Coding Guidance: Interprofessional Consultations during the COVID-19 pandemic

The Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) Coding Committee; Steve Rad, MD; Trisha Malisch, CCS-P, CPC; Vanita Jain, MD The SMFM Coding Committee has recently published coding guidance for COVID-19 and pregnancy (https://www.smfm.org/covid19). Due to recent concerns about decreasing exposure... Continue Reading

Coding for Telemedicine and Remote Patient Monitoring Services during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) Coding Committee; Steve Rad, MD; Dave Smith, CPC, MBA; Trisha Malisch, CCS-P, CPC; Vanita Jain, MD The purpose of this document is to provide maternal-fetal medicine subspecialists interim coding guidance for telemedicine and remote patient... Continue Reading

Coding for Telemedicine and Remote Patient Monitoring Services during the COVID-19 Pandemic

The Society for Maternal-Fetal Medicine (SMFM) Coding Committee; Steve Rad, MD; Dave Smith, CPC, MBA; Trisha Malish, CCS-P, CPC; Vanita Jain, MD The purpose of this document is to provide maternal-fetal medicine subspecialists interim coding guidance for telemedicine and remote patient monitoring... Continue Reading

Billing for pregnancy termination or delivery at 20+ weeks gestational age

Starting at 20 weeks 0 days, the appropriate maternity care and delivery code (594XX) with the relevant diagnosis (e.g. O36.4XX_ maternal care for intrauterine death) is billed for pregnancy terminations (eg, D&E) and delivery. If applicable, you could also report 76988-26 for ultrasound... Continue Reading

How is gestational age assigned for coding and billing purposes?

Traditionally, gestational age is determined by the assigned “due date” or EDD (estimated date of delivery)/EDC (estimated date of confinement). The first day of the LMP (last menstrual period) is the first step in establishing the EDD. By convention, the EDD is 280 days after the... Continue Reading

Report umbilical cord and certain placental issues that occur in the antepartum period

The International Classification of Disease, 10th edition (ICD-10-CM), has a specific code category for umbilical cord complications (O69). However, the use of codes from this category is limited to the labor and delivery period. Using codes from this category during the antepartum period,... Continue Reading