Neurology & Pain Management Coding Alert

Know what procedures can be reported separately, add appropriate modifiers.When performing a sleep study, your neurologist may also complete a number of additional procedures such as obtaining an EEG or a cardiac rhythm recording. Avoid the trap of erroneously reporting additional services by knowing which procedures are included in the sleep study codes, clarifying who did the recording, and knowing what was recorded. Starting point: You report sleep testing procedures with CPT® codes 95800 (Sleep study, unattended, simultaneous recording; heart rate, oxygen saturation, respiratory analysis [e.g., by airflow or peripheral arterial tone], and sleep time) through 95811 (Polysomnography; sleep staging with 4 or more additional parameters of sleep, with initiation of continuous positive airway pressure therapy or bilevel ventilation, attended by a technologist). Distinguish Polysomnography from Sleep StudyFinding notes regarding "sleep staging" helps you distinguish polysomnography from sleep studies. When the neurologist records and stages the patient's sleep, you should [...]