Hello everyone,

I hope someone can help me with the correct procedure codes.

The documentation is as follows:
“That lesion is quite large and it measures about 1.50 cm by about 1 cm. It is somewhat suggestive of a superficial squamous cell and we felt that that should be biopsied. That was done as described below. Following this we did do a curettage ablation with the electrocautery unit of the rest of that lesion to destroy the rest of it.

Shave excision of entire lesion done using Ellman Loop. Hemostasis was obtained with electrocautery.”

They had billed 17000 and 11102. The path came back malignant.

The way I am reading the documentation is he had done the shave of the entire lesion and then did the curettage ablation with the electrocautery to destroy the rest of the same lesion. Except, if they shaved the whole lesion would there be anything left to do the ablation.

1. I thought you couldnt do 2 procedures on the same lesion, but I can’t find this in writing.

2. If they had only shaved part of the lesion for biopsy then did the ablation of the rest of the lesion. I would see billing both.