Oncology & Hematology Coding Alert

Coding Quiz:

Can You Ace This Hormone Receptor Coding Quiz?

Published on Tue Aug 23, 2022

Answer these three questions to brush up on your breast cancer coding knowledge.

One important factor in determining the best possible treatment for breast cancer is the patient’s estrogen receptor status. Breast cancers are classified as either hormone receptor positive (HR+) or negative (HR-); more specifically, the hormones can be either estrogen, with a positive or negative status (ER+ or ER-), or progesterone, also with a positive or negative receptor status (PR+ or PR-).

Importantly, HR+ breast cancers require treatment with drugs that either block hormone production or lower hormone levels, while HR- breast cancer are not responsive to drug treatments and can only be treated by surgery.

Consequently, understanding the role hormone receptors play in breast cancer treatment, and how this impacts code choice, is vitally important. That’s why we came up with this hormone receptor quiz to test your knowledge of hormone receptor testing, diagnosis, and hormone treatment coding.

Question 1: CPT^®lists several tests for estrogen receptor status. What are they, how are they different, and how are the results recorded?

Question 2: What ICD-10-CM codes do you use for ER+ and ER-, and how are they sequenced for a patient with breast cancer?

Question 3: Your oncologist prescribes fulvestrant to an ER+ patient. How is the drug and its administration coded?

Think you know the answers? Click here to know the Answers.