Ob-Gyn Coding Alert

Question: When a Medicare patient only comes in only for a pessary cleaning, what CPT^® code should we use?

Wisconsin Subscriber

Answer: For routine cleaning, you would report an E/M service only (such as, 99212, Office or other outpatient visit …).

If this patient has an infection that requires treatment due to the pessary, you can go with 57150 (Irrigation of vagina and/or application of medicament for treatment of bacterial, parasitic, or fungoid disease) — but only if you have a confirmed bacterial, parasitic or yeast infection. If that’s the case, you probably cannot also report an E/M service with this code.