There are three large categories of anesthesia used in surgical operations, and general anesthesia is one of the most common types aside from regional and local varieties. As the term implies, general anesthesia basically presents a coma induced with the help of anesthetic medications affecting the entire body. After such agents’ administration, patients lose protective motor reflexes while becoming increasingly relaxed. These effects allow those in the operating theater to perform procedures requiring precise manipulations and incisions that would cause unbearable pain and make the patient move chaotically without anesthesia, thus exacerbating the risks of mistakes.
Multiple surgical treatments require properly administered general anesthesia to be completed successfully. Among them is cranial surgery; this procedure’s CPT code is 00210 (Anesthesia Business Consultants, n.d.). As a surgery type, cranial surgery involves invasive or minimally invasive procedures for various serious and life-threatening conditions, including brain tumors, aneurysms, blood clots, neurological disorders, and other diseases (Chen et al., 2020). Given such conditions’ severity and the need for prompt but highly precise surgical actions, keeping the patient completely immobilized and having no responses to pain can be crucial for minimizing distractions and barriers to success. With that in mind, general anesthesia presents the most appropriate type for the procedure being discussed.
Medical coders should develop and demonstrate a solid understanding of anesthesia and its most common types to be able to update healthcare clients’ records accurately and avoid mistakes causing revenue losses. Without easy access to documentation, documentation gaps, or a clear understanding of anesthesia types and associated service duration characteristics, coders can report anesthesia time incorrectly. Additionally, medical coders’ understanding of anaesthesiology regulations and the properties of anesthetic administration procedures promotes coders’ ability to detect obvious errors in medical reports that require clarification prior to code assignment efforts.
References
Anesthesia Business Consultants. (n.d.). List of CPT codes for anesthesia procedures & services, including modifiers. Web.
Chen, P., Tsuang, F., Lee, C., Yeh, Y., Cheng, H., Lee, T., Changg, Y. W., Chang, Y. J., & Wu, C. (2020). Neuroprotective effects of intraoperative dexmedetomidine infusion combined with goal-directed hemodynamic therapy for patients undergoing cranial surgery: A double-blinded randomized controlled trial. Research Square, 1-20. Web.