Practice Management

When performing diagnostic and interventional radiology coding audits, is there an accepted industry standard for statistically valid sample sizes of total accessions reviewed?

Thanks,

John

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    John E. Pugh

 P:  609.644.4479

 F:  609.503.2476

John – Others may have a different response but for me it is about establishing the confidence of the accuracy of the audit. You can establish a 60% confidence that the audit is statistically significant up to 99% confidence. I usually shoot for 80%. Once that confidence level has been set it's a simple calculation knowing the "n" or number of charts there are to audited and then pulling up a "t" Table and calculate the numbers of charts to audit to hit the confidence level you wish to achieve.  Granted I was a bit more picky when I was doing audits because I wanted to be able to make a statement that that I was XX% confident that the dictations met compliance requirements for coding, etc. The Radiologists always seems very appreciative of that effort and when you included the t-tail calculations in the report they knew exactly what was done and why.... Hope that helps.....