Membership Update: Tips for capturing chronic kidney disease
CDI Strategies, December 10, 2015
Want to receive articles like this one in your inbox? Subscribe to CDI Strategies!
Editor’s Note: Did you know that the ACDIS homepage is updated weekly with a new, complimentary featured article? Here’s a peek at the most recent offering.
To understand how to appropriately assign codes for chronic kidney disease (CKD) and acute kidney injury (AKI), instead of just reporting the codes that correspond with each and every note in the record, coders need to take a closer look at the clinical picture. Generally speaking, people with AKI are more likely to develop CKD in later years, and people with CKD are more likely to develop AKI.
“A lot of this relationship is modified by the severity of AKI, the stage of CKD, the duration of AKI, and the number of episodes,” says Garry L. Huff, MD, CCS, CCDS, AHIMA-approved ICD-10-CM/PCS trainer and president of Enjoin, formerly Huff DRG Review, in Eads, Tennessee.
This may start to sound like alphabet soup if coders don’t take the time to investigate what is actually going on with the patient and query the physician when necessary.
Whether the documentation notes decreased kidney function, the presence of radiographic or biochemical evidence of kidney damage, or a glomerular filtration rate (GFR) of less than 60 ml/min/1.73m2, CKD is established only when this abnormality persists for at least three months.
And it’s important to understand the difference between acute and chronic: If the patient has AKI, that means the condition is reversible; CKD means that it’s not reversible.
Want to receive articles like this one in your inbox? Subscribe to CDI Strategies!
Related Products
Most Popular
- Articles
-
- Math can be tricky: TJC corrects ABHR storage requirement
- Air control equals infection control
- Don't forget the three checks in medication administration
- Note similarities and differences between HCPCS, CPT® codes
- Five ways to safeguard your patients' valuables
- The consequences of an incomplete medical record
- Q&A: Primary, principal, and secondary diagnoses
- OB services: Coding inside and outside of the package
- Skills of effective case managers
- Practice the six rights of medication administration
- E-mailed
-
- Air control equals infection control
- OSHA HazCom updates include labeling, SDS requirements
- Plan of Care Supports Documentation of Homebound Status
- Note similarities and differences between HCPCS, CPT® codes
- Note from the instructor: CMS clarifies billing guidelines on proper billing for drugs in a single-dose or single-use vial, including billing for discarded drugs
- Neurological checks for head injuries
- Modifiers and medical necessity
- Follow these tips to properly report bladder catheter codes
- Five ways to safeguard your patients' valuables
- Differentiate between types of wound debridement
- Searched