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Pathology/Lab Coding Alert

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Malignant Neoplasm of Skin

Published on Sun Apr 01, 2001

Question: What diagnosis code should I use when a patient has a previously diagnosed skin cancer that extended to the margins of the submitted specimen, and the current specimen shows no residual cancer?

Arkansas Subscriber

Test your coding knowledge. Determine how you would code this situation before looking at the box below for the answer.



Answer: The correct diagnosis code is 173.x (other malignant neoplasm of skin) even though the current specimen shows no residual cancer. The reason for the specimen removal and examination was an incom-pletely excised skin cancer, so that is the correct diagnosis. This is true whether the incompletely excised skin cancer specimen was submitted on the same day or at a later date.

Answered by R.M. Stainton Jr., MD, president of Doctors Anatomic Pathology Services, an independent pathology laboratory in Jonesboro, Ark.

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