Discharge day management

In this scenario, the attending physician billed a discharge day management code, the patient stayed an extra day and a physician from the same group on the actual day of discharge billed a subsequent visit code after his colleague had already billed the discharge code. Is this acceptable?

Discharge day management

There's nothing in CPT or CMS that would prohibit this. However, I think that the payer's claims editing systems will not pay for a subsequent visit after the discharge service. If the claims have not been submitted yet, I would change the coding to a subsequent visit on the day prior to discharge, and the discharge service the day of the discharge.

If you have already submitted it the other way, let us know what the payer does when it processes the claims.

discharge

According to Transmittal 1460 (2-22-08), "The E&M discharge day management visit shall be reported for the date of the actual visit by the physician or qualified non-physician practitioner, even if the patient is discharged from the facility on a different calendar date."
If the discharge day services were already performed, what is the medical necessity for a billable charge the next day??

Agree with above

If the patient was kept as a convenience, the next day should not be billed at all. If the patient had a change in condition and the discharge was cancelled then the first doc should change to a subsequent visit code and the next day the doc should bill for the discharge since the change in condition would warrant re-evaluation of the meds, followup plans, and a new summary.