Oncology & Hematology Coding Alert

Understand etiology and synonyms for accurate dx documentation.

Cancer and fatigue go hand-in-hand, which means you have probably coded them together for as long as you can remember. But have you been assigning the correct ICD-10-CM codes for your patients suffering from this common cancer side effect? More, have you been using fatigue codes when your oncologist documents similar conditions, such as malaise, exhaustion, lethargy, lack of energy, and so on.

Time for a check-up on your coding strategies for reporting cancer and fatigue, then. Here are four scenarios involving the two conditions. Solve them correctly, and you can call yourself a cancer coding ace.

Scenario 1: A patient with acute myeloblastic leukemia reports to your oncologist complaining of fatigue. How do you code this?

Scenario 2: A patient with acute myeloblastic leukemia reports to your oncologist complaining of fatigue. The provider documents the fatigue is due to anemia, which is directly linked to the patient’s cancer. How do you code this?

Scenario 3: A patient with acute myeloblastic leukemia reports to your oncologist complaining of fatigue. The provider documents the fatigue is due to anemia, but this time, the provider determines the anemia is due to the chemotherapy the patient is receiving for the acute myeloblastic leukemia. How do you code this?

Scenario 4: Instead of documenting fatigue, your provider documents a patient presents with weakness, malaise, lethargy, tiredness, debility, or chronic fatigue. Would this change your coding of the scenario and, if so, how?

Think you know the answers?