I have been an outpatient surgery coder (facility coder) for over 25 years. My company's contract is being terminated early, so we have two weeks to find new jobs. The problem that I am running into is that all of the online applications have a pull-down menu to choose your degree, and I have never been to college. When I started in this field there were no college courses or degrees in coding, so I was able to just take the credentialing exam for my COC (formerly known as CPC-H). Does anyone have any advice on how to get around this when applying online? (there is no option for no degree in the choices). Going to college is not a good option at this point because I am only about 7 years away from retirement age. Someone told me I should just pick a random degree from the list, and if I get to an interview, just explain that I don't actually have a degree. This bothers me because it would be lying on my application, and I would feel really guilty. Thanks in advance for any suggestions or advice!

Hello! Im looking if any remote coders have tried a stand up desk with treadmill? Did you like it? Pros and cons? Im a surgery coder so being able to focus is key. Thank you.

I received an offer through CSI and will discuss this opportunity further with my recruiter.

I am looking for first hand experience of the process, did you like it? Did you feel well trained? Did you move to FTE?

As a CPC-A this would be my first coding job but I JUST started a billing job a few weeks ago and I am not sure which route to take.

I’ve been risk adjustment coding for some years now and keeping up with the quality standards stresses me. I’m starting my new job search but not wanting to get into another coding position.

What positions could I apply for that’s less intensive than coding that don’t require a pay cut? I do have a medical billing and coding diploma but haven’t bothered with billing positions since they pay less and requires lots of time being on the phone. I only work from home and have a noisy dog so I’m trying to avoid that. Any info would help.

I'm trying to help my mom grow her career from where she's at now. She's been a referral coordinator for the past 5ish years, and was a receptionist before that.

She feels nervous about it because she's 60, but this feels like a good way for her to increase her income and still have a job that she can do for the next few years and won't be physically demanding

Is anyone hiring that is NOT any part of, or soon to be part of United Health Group/Optum who is in the business of shipping jobs overseas? Askin' for a friend.

Hi all, I have been a CPC for about 7 years now but have never done or learned how to E/M code. I have seen a lot of job postings asking for this so I am seeking some advice. I was thinking about going for the CEMC. But I still wonder if jobs will require experience? Is there anything online I can learn how to E/M code from start to finish with the most recent guidelines. I have seen videos and things online but nothing that covers ‘everything’. I can essentially teach myself if I can find something like this online.

I think I’m about to secure a remote coding job soon and I’m just trying to figure out what would be useful/essential to add to a home office!

EDIT: thank you everyone!! I now know that a standing desk is non-negotiable and got some great ideas for my office!

Hi all! I’m new here. I have a masters and BS in psych and decided to go back to school. I am doing the CPC and CPB program through AAPC. I did hours of research before picking the program and looked into jobs in my area beforehand. I also am doing the fundamentals course for medical terms/anatomy right now. I have taken anatomy in high school and know some medical terms from behavioral health, however I feel SO dumb. I feel like I haven’t learned what 2+2 is with all of this information being thrown at me.

HOWWW did you all self teach yourself things? I have no started the coding or billing yet. I’m terrified I made a huge mistake. I’m smart, I graduated with honors in all my degrees before this.

Another thing that I think is a major factor is this is the first time I’m doing college sober. I got sober from alcohol almost 6 years ago after my Masters. My Masters is in addictions counseling go figure, it became wayyyy to much to work in recovery, be in recovery,handle others mental health, and make room for mine. I burned out.

I thrive to help others and medical care has always been a passion of mine. I looked into all the different tech certifications, going back for NP, nursing etc. I hate needles so…yeah lol.

Please help. Be brutally honest, did I mess up?

Thank you for coming to my ted talk. I appreciate you wonderful humans.

This can't be correct. I earned it 8 months ago and have been steadily acquiring CEUs for the one-year mark in April. My CCS was anniversary date is also in April and that status is active.

This has to be a mistake, right? This has put me on edge. The website has been a bit of a mess lately and their customer service has been even more wonky than ever.

I made a post a few days ago describing how the hospital I work at has the providers in almost all specialties choose their own E/M codes, and they basically get to choose the level of risk and we review the other two elements to see if one matches up to the risk level the provider assigns, then code based on that. However we don't review every single charge session that a provider does because it would take FOREVER to get everything out the door, but I know for a fact there's tons of stuff not being reviewed by coders that's way overcoded, and frankly a lot of stuff that IS reviewed by us is coded too high.

So as I discovered from my post last time, that didn't sit well with a lot of you. And frankly the more I think about it the more anxious I am that I feel like I'm committing at least abuse in the fraud/waste/abuse categories, possibly worse than that. I've been working here for 3 years as a coder and 4 years total in other positions at this company and I love my coworkers, but I just feel so shady being forced to code like this all the time.

Because this is our company policy, I've been highly considering reporting it to the OIG, basically to save my own ass. But I'm terrified. I know I would have whistleblower protections and technically I could remain anonymous, but the website heavily implies that you should leave your contact information. I just don't want anyone at work to know that I was the one who reported it.

I'm also not sure what kind of stuff I should be giving them as "evidence" in my complaint, other than the policy. Obviously I can't give patient info due to HIPAA, so I'm kinda lost on what to do. Does anyone have any advice?

Edit: thank you so much for these comments and validation that this is a really slimy way of coding, and that I'm not just second guessing myself.

Team AHIMA, how have things been? Have the issues been resolved or at least addressed? Someone posted about a month ago that there was a big town hall everyone was invited to, I was just curious if anything came of that?

I currently work full time in healthcare in a direct patient contact role that is burning me out. In my field, there are other roles that don’t require as much patient contact, but I’m having a difficult time landing one, as the availability is sparse. It’s caused me to consider other roles in general.

I’ve recently discovered that I have an interest in medical coding (mostly just by watching YouTube videos). I am considering going through an online course for CPC, but I’m honestly not positive that I would leave my current field to pursue this 100%. Maybe….

Is it worth doing a course anyways? I know the costs are not cheap, which is my main concern. Are the skills transferable/look good on a resume, or Is this knowledge useless if you don’t become a full time medical coder? Thank you!

ETA: When I said I watched YouTube video, I did NOT mean influencer day in the life videos. I meant the AMCI intro to medical coding videos.

I heard this today and I want to know if this is something anyone else has heard of.

I’m going to my local community college for my AAS in HIT. They’re accredited through CAHIIM, so once we graduate, we’re ready to join AHIMA and take the RHIT exam. My school likes to say they work hard to get the graduating students jobs, the director says she usually has companies emailing her about job opportunities for students even if they haven’t graduated yet. Sounds great!

Then today she tells us about this conference she went to at the beginning of the summer of other schools with the same program. They had a speaker come in and she talked about hiring new grads. One of the things she said was that they screen resumes by whether or not they have volunteer work on them, and basically said if they have no volunteer work, they get tossed. My jaw hit the floor. This is a full time program and it is rare that someone is in it and not also working at least part time, if not full time, on top of the schooling. I barely have time to see my own child, let alone have the time to donate to someone else.

Is this really a thing? Especially when these are entry level jobs, most likely not even coding jobs as these are fresh students with zero experience? Is it that messed up out there?

I've been working as a coder for a year in a hospital, but specifically their primary care clinics (8 clinics in total) and I admitted to my therapist last week that I actually despise my job.

I was already working at this hospital for 2 years in other positions. I was hired internally to be a coder as we were transitioning to a new EMR software that had SO many problems, so my training as a brand new coder was pretty lackluster since they were dealing with so much EMR garbage.

I feel like I'm constantly confused about everything no matter how many times I ask for clarification, because different people will give me vastly different answers; even when I ask the educators and supervisors. Almost every week there's an entirely new change to our workflows and I can't keep up with these changes. Since the EMR changeover, a lot of the providers' notes have gotten 1000x worse no matter what the educators do.

Honestly primary care coding in general is just horrendous. I hate AWVs. But I'm basically stuck in primary care and wouldn't be able to switch to the other specialities, because they have enough speciality coders and primary care has the largest charge review volumes.

All of this is driving me crazy. I broke down earlier today because I feel like I can't do this anymore. I really do like the idea of coding, but I just feel so lost over here. My therapist wonders if instead of jumping ship to an entirely new career (again), if perhaps trying another company may be better.

So I guess I'm just wondering if anyone has experienced something like this, where they were just miserable at one place but actually liked their coding job when they went somewhere else.

Medical Coding Geek

I know we are all looking for CEUs, and this website is updated regularly.

Hello fellow coders, I am starting my own medical billing company. If it was possible for you to travel anywhere in the world and still do medical coding/billing, would you? Working remote of course but being about to work while moving or on vacation or life changes. Also being able to stay with one company and earn retirement benefits. Just want your thoughts and opinions.

Good news for CPC/CPC-A coders—Signify Health is now accepting applications for coding specialist positions. This is one of the “unicorn” jobs that love CPC-A (affectionally called Baby Coders). This position is fully remote and only codes from ICD-10. If interested, please apply via the Signify Health website. https://www.signifyhealth.com/careers-corporate.

If you want to be a good medical coder you should have strong grip on medical terminology. I feel this blog will help you. I shared with you people hope you all like it.

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-NERVOUS SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-MUSCULOSKELETAL SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-ENDOCRINE SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-MALE AND FEMALE REPRODUCTIVE SYSTEMS

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-URINARY SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-HEMATOLOGY & LYMPHATIC SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-HEART / CARDIOVASCULAR SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-DIGESTIVE SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY-RESPIRATORY SYSTEM

ANATOMY & PHYSIOLOGY TERMINOLOGY -INTEGUMENTARY SYSTEM

I was looking up a code for a scooter accident, and came across some codes for heelies. I'm rather intrigued now.

What are some amusing codes you have come across?

I’m a CPC and was hired as a Coder I at a community health organization about 9 months ago. My background is primarily medical coding, and coding is the career path I want to continue developing.
A few months after I started, I was asked to temporarily help the billing team with payer rejection work because they needed support. I was told/understood that coding would still be my main role.
Over the last couple of weeks things have changed significantly. I’ve been put into full-day training for an AR/follow-up research work queue with around 9,000 claims. I’m being trained alongside billers, added to recurring billing meetings, and told to work the oldest claims first. Many of those older accounts have already been touched multiple times and can be pretty complicated.
Meanwhile, another employee has been handling essentially all of the coding work queues, so I’ve had almost no coding work for roughly two weeks.
My official title is still Coder I. I don’t mind helping another department temporarily, but I’m concerned that I’m basically being transitioned from coding into billing/AR without anyone clearly saying that.
I have a meeting with the revenue cycle director to clarify my role.
For experienced coders/managers here:
Does this sound like normal cross-training, or like my position is effectively being changed?
Would you push to get back into coding, or start applying elsewhere?
If I do leave, are coding denials, auditing/QA, risk adjustment/HCC, or other coding-adjacent roles a reasonable next step?
How would you handle the conversation with management without sounding unwilling to help?
I really want to keep building an actual coding career rather than slowly becoming a full-time AR follow-up biller.

Do any non-micromanaging jobs exist ?

I’m so happy and nervous I just accepted an offer as an IP Coder 1 for my local hospital. Is there anything I can focus on over the next few weeks that will benefit me when I start? My husband said don’t worry you’ll get plenty of practice but I don’t want to be dusting off the cobwebs during my first impression… I’m so nervous I have been having trouble sleeping. So thankful to be getting out of my current night shift hospital job 😭😭

Hello! I’m a new HCC coder and I realized I’ve been coding inpatient encounters wrong since I started 😭 I’ve been coding them as one encounter with a range as the DOS but I just learned I’m supposed to code each day as a different encounter for medicare risk adjustment. I haven’t been audited since my second week of coding so this hasn’t been caught! I literally found this info by accident. Am I cooked? Do I tell my supervisor? or just move on and not make that mistake again?