• Ask the Coder
• I am new to dental coding and having a hard time deciphering exam code D0150 from D0140 for new patients. To provide an example, I had a patient who came to the oral surgeon on referral from her regular dentist to have her wisdom teeth removed. The oral surgeon notes in the history that her wisdom teeth are impacted but asymptomatic, that she has no allergies, her family history is non-contributory, and she's not a smoker. He then takes a panorex and looks at the gums and notes the impacted wisdom teeth and the absence of any malocclusion. He is not including a total perio chart in the record (though he's also indicated the presence of a malpositioned canine tooth). He doesn't mention the hard/soft palates or any soft tissue anomalies (not referencing looking at the tongue or the mucosa). So while he is looking around at a lot of structures in the mouth, not just at the wisdom teeth, he doesn't appear to me to be documenting the full extent of what is described by CDT code D0150, but at the same time, D0140 for a problem-focused exam seems like less than the work he is doing. In this particular example, would you recommend D0150 or D0140?

I am new to dental coding and having a hard time deciphering exam code D0150 from D0140 for new patients. To provide an example, I had a patient who came to the oral surgeon on referral from her regular dentist to have her wisdom teeth removed. The oral surgeon notes in the history that her wisdom teeth are impacted but asymptomatic, that she has no allergies, her family history is non-contributory, and she’s not a smoker. He then takes a panorex and looks at the gums and notes the impacted wisdom teeth and the absence of any malocclusion. He is not including a total perio chart in the record (though he’s also indicated the presence of a malpositioned canine tooth). He doesn’t mention the hard/soft palates or any soft tissue anomalies (not referencing looking at the tongue or the mucosa). So while he is looking around at a lot of structures in the mouth, not just at the wisdom teeth, he doesn’t appear to me to be documenting the full extent of what is described by CDT code D0150, but at the same time, D0140 for a problem-focused exam seems like less than the work he is doing. In this particular example, would you recommend D0150 or D0140?