How Should I Code a Fibrinolytic Agent Instillation Via Chest Tube?

Posted on 28. Jan, 2010 by Editor.

Different calendar dates matter, but multiple instillations the same day do not.

Question: My pulmonologist inserted a chest tube and then instilled a fibrinolytic agent to break up multiloculations to free up an entrapped lung. Usually, I use 32560 for this procedure, which is for pleurodesis, not fibrinolysis. What code should I use for fibrinolytic agent instillation?

Answer: As of Jan. 1, you should be using one of two new fibrinolytic agent instillation codes depending on the treatment day:

• For instillation on the initial day, use 32561 (Instillation[ s], via chest tube/catheter, agent for fibrinolysis [e.g., fibrinolytic agent for breakup of multiloculated effusion]; initial day).

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What’s the Code for ‘Fir Tree in Lung’?

Posted on 24. Apr, 2009 by .

The mainstream press has been buzzing about the live fir tree that Russian doctors removed from a man’s lung. Some say the story just has to be an urban myth. But here at Coding News, we have other fish to fry (or firs to code). How would you code it? Here’s the ‘op note,’ if you will.

Twenty-eight-year-old Artyom Sidorkin presented complaining of chest pain and coughing up blood. An x-ray revealed what doctors thought was a malignant lung tumor, so they took him into surgery. Instead, physicians found a 3-inch live fir tree growing in his lung tissue. One Russian surgeon thinks the young man swallowed a seed, which then grew. Please click here for full story and photos from an English-language Russian news site.

So what would be the correct coding if this case occurred in the US? How about …

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