Primary Care Coding Alert

Squeeze these V90 retained fragment codes onto fall tickets.When you can't get all of a splinter out, a new diagnosis code series will soon tell the story. FPs are all too familiar with foreign body removal that gets only part of the object -- and come this fall they'll have a diagnosis code that explains the condition.Pieces of wood, glass, or bullet shrapnel might be left in during foreign body removal. The fragment may break or split, making removing the entire foreign body impossible.This condition has stumped many a family physician. Sometimes, with a wood splinter removal, the procedure removes some foreign body, but not all of it, related one Atlanta FP. Is the FBR ICD-9 code still appropriate? In the event, the patient had further FBR done at another encounter, would using the FBR diagnosis at the initial FBR encounter mean future claims using the same ICD-9 code would be [...]