# billing consults



## mgnitecka (Apr 28, 2008)

if a physician who is being consulted just writes the name of the department which requested the consult as opposed to the physician name who requested the consult is this sufficient?


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## RebeccaWoodward* (Apr 28, 2008)

I have always been told that the actual physicians name needs to be listed.

http://www.donself.com/documents/Consultation_Guidelines.htm


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## FTessaBartels (Apr 28, 2008)

*Inpatient?*

In the *hospital setting *we sometimes see our specialists write "asked by ER"  or "asked by Critical Care" ...  Because we have access to the full medical record for these inpatients we can ascertain which ER doc or Critical Care intensivist placed the order for the consult.  Our Compliance department has indicated that it is sufficient in these scenarios for the consulting MD to just indicate the department that requested the consult, but the coder needs to be able to easily discern the actual name of the requesting physician to put it on the claim. 

This would not work, however, in an office setting where you don't actually have a shared medical record. 

F Tessa Bartels CPC


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