Neurosurgery Coding Alert

Question: If a surgeon states in the operative note dictation that they did a lumbar laminectomy and lateral recess decompression for spinal canal decompression, what code can we use, 63005 or 63047?

Answer: You are correct to report 63047 (Laminectomy, facetectomy and foraminotomy [unilateral or bilateral with decompression of spinal cord, cauda equina and/or nerve root(s), (e.g., spinal or lateral recess stenosis)], single vertebral segment; lumbar)/63048 (………..single vertebral segment; each additional segment, cervical, thoracic, or lumbar [List separately in addition to code for primary procedure]) for laminectomy at the lumbar levels. If three different segmental nerves were decompressed at the three joint levels (L2-3, L3-4 and L4-5), you correctly report one unit of 63047 and 2 units of 63048. If however, four segmental nerves were decompressed, you would report three units of 63048 in addition to 63047.