Nuclear coding in hospital

[NRix]

My dr. does his nuclear stress test out of a hospital. I have been coding him with a 78452-26 for the nuclear interpretation of the test, but now he telling me I should code the stress(93015) also for interpretation. Is this true? or does in change because of place of service.

 

[Luna]

My dr. does his nuclear stress test out of a hospital. I have been coding him with a 78452-26 for the nuclear interpretation of the test, but now he telling me I should code the stress(93015) also for interpretation. Is this true? or does in change because of place of service.

NRix,
I was just reviewing this in my Cardiology chapter. Here is what I understand:

The CPT guidelines for coding with 78452 includes this: When performed during exercise and/or pharmacologic stress, the appropriate stress testing code from the 93015-93018 series should be reported in addition to 78451-78454, 78472-78492.

Something to know then about coding with 93015-93018 is this:

93015 includes supervision, interpretation and report; this code is used when the physician owns the equipment and provides all components.

The remaining codes in that series break the components up so that modifier 26 is not needed.

93016 is supervision only

93017 is tracing only, without interpretation and report

93018 is interpretation and report only

If a physician, not owning the equipment, provides the supervision, interpretation, and report (all components), then you code both 93016 and 93018.

PS. Because I am a student, if anyone sees an error in my understanding, or where more information can be provided to help clarify things further, I am eager to hear it. This has been a very daunting chapter.