Podiatry Coding & Billing Alert

Question: My podiatrist diagnosed a patient with bilaterial verrucae. She treated two sites (one for each foot). Should I bill 17110 and use the left (LT) and right (RT) modifiers?

Hawaii Subscriber

Answer: That's a no-no. Location should not matter when you're coding 17110 (Destruction [e.g., laser surgery, electrosurgery, cryosurgery, chemosurgery, surgical curettement], of benign lesions other than skin tags or cutaneous vascular proliferative lesions; up to 14 lesions), which includes treatment of wart number one through 14, for verrucae (078.19). Never report this code twice for bilateral treatments.

Option: Some dermatologists use 17000 (Destruction [e.g., laser surgery, electrosurgery, cryosurgery, chemosurgery,surgical curettement], premalignant lesions [e.g., actinic keratoses]; first lesion) for the first wart and +17003 (... second through 14 lesions, each [List separately in addition to code for first lesion]) for each additional wart through number 14.