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Cardiology Coding Alert

1 Simple Tool Can Make Your Consult Documentation Easy

Published on Tue Apr 11, 2006

Stymied by a lack of written consult requests?  Here's a faxable form

If you have trouble getting requesting physicians to document their consult requests in writing, we've got just the tool for you.

Although technically a consult request can be in writing or verbal, Medicare requires written proof of the request. Other payers are increasingly requiring written proof as well.

A new way that you can ensure that requests for all consultations you perform are well-documented is to fax the requesting physician a form to file in the patient's chart, which simply documents the physician's consultation request.

Several subscribers asked us to share this form with readers, and we listened. The form on included with the previous article was written by Barbara J. Cobuzzi, MBA, CPC, CPC-H, CHBME, president of CRN Healthcare Solutions in Tinton Falls, N.J., who allowed us to reprint it for our cardiology subscribers' benefit.

Best practice: You can fax the form to a requesting physician who hasn't asked in writing for your cardiologist's advice and ask him to fax it back to you--or you can use the form to ask a specialist for his opinion.

If you use it to request a consult from another physician, you should print the form on two-part no-carbon-required paper. This way, one form goes with the patient to the specialist, and one stays in your chart, as the requesting physician, to meet insurers' requirements, Cobuzzi says.

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