A Strong Coding Foundation

The healthcare field involves the use of medical language in note taking and diagnosis. For a professional in this are it is necessary to have the coding skills. This paper will look at importance of understanding medical terminology and anatomy in attaining these skills.

Effective Coding

The most significant step in a health care profession involves learning the common medical terminology and understanding the code’s meaning. This helps in correct diagnosis and performance of procedural codes written in medical language as in a physician’s notes, thus building the coder’s confidence.

The American Academy of Professional Coder’s (AAPC’s) offers essential courses like Medical Terminology and Anatomy, for medical coding and billing and career preparation in a non-clinical medical profession. It uses the coder’s view to introduce students to the human body in a medical coding and reimbursement profession language. It also provides the certified professional coder (CPC) exam to assess this knowledge requirement.

The seriousness

It is important to take the medical terminology course seriously in order to gain a strong medical knowledge base by avoiding the rush through text, smash through quiz and cramming for exams to ensure long term retention of information. Alternatively, different study methods such as chunking, making mental notes, creating flash cards for a chapter and memorizing by association can be used. In addition, one can also focus more on challenging areas.

Application to CPC Exam

The CPC exam’s open book is a great resource for preparation as it contains anatomy images which offer more understanding. Additionally, while taking the exam, confidence and quick movement through questions is of importance.

An understanding of medical terminology and anatomy is also essential in the implementation ICD-10-CM and ICD-10-PCS which is more detailed and involves consistent terminology.

Conclusion

Due to the importance of knowledge terminology and human anatomy all coders and medical records professionals should ensure that they possess it.

References

Ericson, B., 2009. A Strong Coding Foundation: Build upon Medical Terminology and

Anatomy for CPC Success. Retrieved from < http://healthinformation.advanceweb.com/Student-and-New-Grad-Center/Certifications-and-Credentials/A-Strong-Coding-Foundation.aspx> on 10th July, 2010.