Oncology & Hematology Coding Alert

But you'll still need to look elsewhere to report renal pelvis neoplasms.When ICD-10-CM replaces ICD-9-CM on Oct. 1, 2013, you'll be stuck reporting a lot of "unspecified" codes if your practice doesn't have its documentation ducks in a row. That's because many of the ICD-10-CM codes require more anatomic location information than ICD-9-CM codes currently do. As an example, take a look at the codes for kidney malignant neoplasms.ICD-9-CM: Under ICD-9-CM, you should report a primary malignant kidney neoplasm using 189.0 (Malignant neoplasm of kidney except pelvis). As the code definition specifies, 189.0 is not appropriate for a pelvis neoplasm. For that diagnosis, you should instead look to 189.1 (Malignant neoplasm of renal pelvis).ICD-10-CM: The main difference between ICD-9-CM and ICD-10-CM is that the latter references right, left, and unspecified kidney:C64.1, Malignant neoplasm of right kidney, except renal pelvisC64.2, Malignant neoplasm of left kidney, except renal pelvis C64.9, Malignant neoplasm [...]