My co-worker and I have been having the same discussion; our surgeon's are discribing this scenerio as "Completion Thyroidectomies" but in reality, they are not; thru all my extensive research and discussions with the surgeons, one parenthetical statement appears in CPT that clarifies this situation;
under CPT 60260 the parenthetical statement reads:
(for bilateral procedure, report 60260 with modifier 50)
This single statement stops any question as to when CPT 60260 should be used. When a surgeon only removes a portion of a right or a left thyroid lobe and then needs to go back in to remove the rest of that right or left thyroid lobe, that's a "completion thyroidectomy", where the end result is the complete removal of a right or a left thyroid lobe, not the complete removal of the total thyroid (both right & left lobes); partial thyroid lobectomies are billed using CPT 60210 and 60212 when a portion of a right or a left thyroid lobe is removed, these codes should preceed the use of CPT 60260.
To answer the original question, yes, CPT 60220 would be correct in billing the your left thyroidectomy following the removal of the right thyroid lobe back in 7/09.
Hope this helps.
Jennifer
CT ENT
