Neurosurgery Coding Alert

Question: For bilateral removal of a spinal metastatic tumor, our surgeon did a thoracic laminectomy from T1-T11. Do we report multiple units of code 63276 (Laminectomy for biopsy/excision of intraspinal neoplasm; extradural, thoracic) for this procedure?

Alaska Subscriber

Answer: You report code 63276 only once per region. Regardless of the number of laminae removed, you report only one unit of 63276, assuming the location of the metastasis was in the epidural space. You do not need any modifiers in this case.

Note: If your surgeon did the laminectomy in the lumbar region as well, you may report code 63277 (Laminectomy for biopsy/excision of intraspinal neoplasm; extradural, lumbar) in addition to 63276 if more than two additional levels of lumbar laminectomy were performed. You would need to report modifier 51 (Multiple procedures) with the lesser valued procedure. Note that CCI does not bundle the two together.