A point of information: the method in most states for determining the cause of death for this is to review the morbidity and determine if the person would have died at this time from that. For example, if the patient had known heart disease, would they have been alive had they not had the virus.
By the way this is exactly the same method used when the CDC reviews death certificates to estimate flu deaths. If you tested positive for the flu, and died from heart failure—it’s a flu related illness.
My point is, you are paying attention now. This is the way it’s been done all along. And a Medicare patient that dies of CV is not going to earn the hospital any more than someone dying of heart failure. There is no financial incentive to miscode them.
I retired from U of M last year as Sr Reimbursement Analyst and my specialty was Medicare, Medicaid reimbursement, rates, drg’s, tracking admits, discharges, ICD-10 codes, modifiers of coding, re-admits, cash payments from Medicare and Medicaid.
Our hospital will get an average of around 20K=30K extra for Medicare patient with Corona. Just FYI.