Neurosurgery Coding Alert

You should not claim 20660 (Application of cranial tongs, caliper, or stereotactic frame, including removal [separate procedure]) or +61795 (Stereotactic computer-assisted volumetric [navigational] procedure, intracranial, extracranial or spinal [List separately in addition to code for primary procedure]) in addition to 61796 (Stereotactic radiosurgery [particle beam, gamma ray, or linear accelerator]; 1 simple cranial lesion).

AMA guidelines and national Correct Coding Initiative (CCI) edits both stress that you should consider the planning phase of the stereotactic radiosurgery (61795) as part of the main surgical procedure (61796).

You can recoup payment, however, for the frame application with +61800 (Application of stereotactic headframe for stereotactic radiosurgery [List separately in addition to code for primary procedure]) if your neurosurgeon uses a frame-based treatment system.