Radiology Coding Alert

Question: If the technician performs an ultrasound on a patient who didn’t know she was pregnant, and the radiologist interpretation is ectopic pregnancy, should we report an obstetric or nonobstetric ultrasound?

Washington Subscriber

Answer: For a case like this, you should "Use code 76700, or 76705, as appropriate, since the ultrasound was ordered on the indication that it was not pregnancy related," according to CPT® Assistant (October 2001).

The named codes are nonobstetric:

• 76700, Ultrasound, abdominal, real time with image documentation; complete
• 76705, … limited (e.g., single organ, quadrant, follow-up).

Base your final code choice on the scans that were ordered and performed. For instance, if the order requests a pelvic scan and that’s what’s performed, you should report the appropriate nonobstetric pelvic ultrasound code. Examples include 76856-76857 (Ultrasound, pelvic [nonobstetric], real time with image documentation …).

Documentation will also dictate your final ICD-9 code choice, such as 633.00 (Abdominal pregnancy without intrauterine pregnancy).

Bonus tip: Code 633.00 crosses to ICD-10 code O00.0 (Abdominal pregnancy). This confusing looking code is the letter "O" followed by numeral zeroes.