Hi I have what may seem to be a dumb question I was hoping someone could answer for me. Let me preface by saying I'm still new to coding so this is probably going to be an obvious answer to you. I've been doing some practice questions to prepare for my certification exam and I'm finding that I keep running into problems finding codes for when particular medications, IVs, antibiotics, therapies ect. are used to treat a health problem.
There's usually some detail missing that prevents me from finding the proper code. Since these are practice questions it's not like I can ask a physician for more details. I have this problem a lot with IVs. For example, I may see a question indicating a brand of medicine was administered through IV but when I look under IV or intravenous or even injection I can't find anything. Sometimes even searching under the brand, or type of medication or even the health problem itself won't yield satisfactory results.
Other times I will run into problems where I will get information about types or brands of medications given but no details about how. This becomes a problem when I discover that there are multiple ways a medication can be delivered and I'm not sure which code to choose. Basically I don't have problem coding for diagnoses and procedures but when I see vague description of medications given to treat a problem (ie. antibiotics, fluids, painkillers, ointments ect.) I'm not sure what to do with the information. Are these things I should be trying to find codes for when it's that vague? Is there a set of guidelines I'm not aware of? Thanks for your help.
There's usually some detail missing that prevents me from finding the proper code. Since these are practice questions it's not like I can ask a physician for more details. I have this problem a lot with IVs. For example, I may see a question indicating a brand of medicine was administered through IV but when I look under IV or intravenous or even injection I can't find anything. Sometimes even searching under the brand, or type of medication or even the health problem itself won't yield satisfactory results.
Other times I will run into problems where I will get information about types or brands of medications given but no details about how. This becomes a problem when I discover that there are multiple ways a medication can be delivered and I'm not sure which code to choose. Basically I don't have problem coding for diagnoses and procedures but when I see vague description of medications given to treat a problem (ie. antibiotics, fluids, painkillers, ointments ect.) I'm not sure what to do with the information. Are these things I should be trying to find codes for when it's that vague? Is there a set of guidelines I'm not aware of? Thanks for your help.