Today I was a bit confused while searching for a code one of my doctors presented for a nursing home patient. Mind you all I had was the Date of Service, patient's name and the diagnoses (typical for the nursing homes). This one particular code was "Alzheimer's with depressive disorder." I spent a fair amount of time researching this prior to calling our "billing department" (the company who was doing the billing for 13 yrs prior to my starting in house) for assistance. I will call them for a second opinion, just in case... the person I spoke to who "has been certified for over 14 years" couldn't find any codes and told me to "just put Alzheimer's at this point, it doesn't matter". I told her it couldn't be done that way. She said not to waste any more tiime on it. I spent another 5 minutes and believe I found the appropriate code. I would appreciate your input please... I coded 331.0, 300.4 Alzheimer's Dysthymic disorder (depressive reaction) based on the coder's dictionary.
Thanks in advance, and sorry for the long post here.
Thanks in advance, and sorry for the long post here.