The location of the skin cancer is near areas important for daily functioning (fingers) or for appearance (the nose.)
When earlier treatments have not worked.
When the tumor is large and/or when regular surgery is less likely to be successful at removing the cancer.
If you conduct and are submitting Mohs for reimbursement you should know that most often, billing / coding problems occur when a different MD completes the pathology analysis or if the analysis takes place on a different day than the procedure itself. Such stringent rules apply because the “majority of skin cancers can be managed by simple excision or destruction techniques” so it’s also particularly critical that you document your patient charts carefully. MMS must be shown to be the most appropriate choice for the treatment of a particular lesion” in order to increase your chances of correct coding and therefore, cost recovery.
Coding is a challenging field. We have purposely not listed the specific codes for MMS Mohs procedures because, as no doubt you are already aware, changes to coding often takes place. Training for every member of your team from the billing surgical practitioner to the front desk staff and any and all persons managing your claims submissions and accounting processes is crucial to ensuring your practice gets paid appropriately for the work performed. Perhaps it’s easier for you to consider outsourcing this work to a team of experts who only deal with codes, all day long every, every day. Derm Care Billing Consultants specialize in dermatology practice billing and our exceptional knowledge is always current and augmented regularly with training and updates for our professional team. We make coding seem simple – that’s our specialty. We’ll leave the skin care up to you!
