Wiki IP Consults VS Transfer of care

[khoffman]

Hello fellow Co-workers

I work in a multi-speciality clinic that does ORTHO, GYN, ENT, NEURO, URO, General Surg, and Vascular.

Say a patient is picked up as a result of an ER /admitt and the ER doc wants a Surgical opinion, we assume the care of the pateint as we took them to surgery. The attending admitted the patient already, they are IP status. Would We be able to bill the IP Consult or would this be Transfer of care?

I need your input and if you have any references to this for me to give my Physicians. We are doing Audits on Consults. IP is ?????

thank you

Kathy Hoffman CPC
North Carolina.

 

[mmelcam]

I would code this as an in-patient consult as long as there is a request written in the patient's hospital chart for your physician's opinion. It shouldn't matter if his assesment resulted in the need for surgery, it would still be a consult.