Chapter 33 — Quiz

24 questions: multiple choice and short answer. The answer key is in the collapsed block at the bottom. All dollar figures are this book's constructed teaching figures.


1. Under IPPS, a hospital's payment for an inpatient Medicare stay is determined primarily by:

  • A. The total charges on the UB-04
  • B. The number of covered days
  • C. The MS-DRG the coded record groups to
  • D. The hospital's cost report

2. IPPS became effective for cost reporting periods beginning:

  • A. January 1, 1965
  • B. October 1, 1983
  • C. October 1, 2007
  • D. October 1, 2015

3. The principal diagnosis is the condition:

  • A. Present on admission that is most severe
  • B. Listed first in the ED record
  • C. Established after study to be chiefly responsible for occasioning the admission
  • D. That consumed the most resources during the stay

4. A patient is admitted for chest pain; the workup establishes an acute myocardial infarction. The principal diagnosis is:

  • A. The chest pain, because it occasioned the admission
  • B. The infarction, because it was established after study
  • C. Either, at the coder's discretion
  • D. Whichever produces the higher-weighted DRG

5. A discharge summary documents "probable pulmonary embolism." On the inpatient claim this is:

  • A. Not coded; code the symptoms instead
  • B. Coded as if established
  • C. Coded only with a query response
  • D. Coded with POA = U

6. Short answer: name the data set whose definitions govern inpatient reporting, including the principal diagnosis.

7. A record carries one MCC and three CCs among its secondaries. The severity tier is set by:

  • A. The sum of all four designations
  • B. The MCC alone
  • C. The three CCs, because they outnumber the MCC
  • D. The average severity of the secondaries

8. Adding a fourth well-documented CC to the record in question 7 changes this claim's payment by:

  • A. One tier
  • B. The CC's relative weight
  • C. Nothing
  • D. It depends on the payer

9. The CC and MCC designations are revised:

  • A. Quarterly, with the HCPCS update
  • B. Annually, in the IPPS final rule
  • C. Every October 1, in the ICD-10-CM Guidelines
  • D. Only when Congress acts

10. The grouper's steps, in order, are:

  • A. MDC → severity split → surgical partition → pre-MDC check
  • B. Pre-MDC check → MDC → surgical partition → severity split
  • C. Surgical partition → MDC → pre-MDC check → severity split
  • D. Severity split → MDC → surgical partition → pre-MDC check

11. Whether a stay takes the surgical partition is decided by:

  • A. Whether the patient went to the operating room
  • B. The presence of an OR-designated ICD-10-PCS code on the record
  • C. The attending physician's specialty
  • D. The CPT code on the professional claim

12. At a base rate of \$6,200.00, a DRG with relative weight 0.8003 pays:

  • A. \$4,064.10
  • B. \$4,961.86
  • C. \$6,829.30
  • D. \$8,003.00

13. On Account 22-8891, the difference between DRG 190 and DRG 191 — \$1,867.44 — is the value of:

  • A. One additional covered day
  • B. The documented phrase "acute respiratory failure with hypoxia" rather than "hypoxia"
  • C. The pressure ulcer's POA indicator
  • D. The wage index adjustment

14. The base rate's labor-related share is adjusted by:

  • A. The conversion factor
  • B. The cost-to-charge ratio
  • C. The hospital's wage index
  • D. The case mix index

15. The case mix index is:

  • A. The average length of stay across discharges
  • B. The average relative weight of a hospital's discharges
  • C. The ratio of charges to costs
  • D. The share of stays with an MCC

16. Short answer: a hospital's CMI rises with no change in its clinical services. Give the two explanations the number alone cannot distinguish.

17. A condition that develops during an outpatient ED encounter, before the inpatient admission order, is reported with POA:

  • A. Y
  • B. N
  • C. U
  • D. W

18. For HAC payment purposes, POA = U is treated like ___ and POA = W is treated like ___:

  • A. Y; N
  • B. N; Y
  • C. N; N
  • D. Y; Y

19. A stage 3 pressure ulcer on the HAC list is reported with POA = N on a record whose only other severity-tier condition is an MCC with POA = Y. The effect of the HAC provision on this claim's payment is:

  • A. The claim is denied
  • B. The stay drops one tier
  • C. Nothing — the POA = Y MCC already sets the tier
  • D. The ulcer's charges are carved out

20. The payment rules key on the geometric rather than the arithmetic mean length of stay because the geometric mean:

  • A. Is always larger
  • B. Is resistant to the long-stay outliers that skew the arithmetic mean
  • C. Includes transfer cases
  • D. Is recalculated more often

21. A DRG pays \$9,300.00 in full with a GMLOS of 5.0 days. A patient is transferred to another acute hospital after 3 days. The transfer payment (per diem, day 1 doubled) is:

  • A. \$5,580.00
  • B. \$7,440.00
  • C. \$9,300.00
  • D. \$3,720.00

22. Short answer: state the transfer rule's cap in one sentence.

23. In ICD-10-PCS, the root operation Resection differs from Excision in that Resection is:

  • A. Performed through an open approach
  • B. The cutting out of all of a body part
  • C. Always accompanied by a device character
  • D. Limited to the Medical and Surgical section

24. In 0DTJ4ZZ, the character "4" reports:

  • A. The body part
  • B. The device
  • C. The approach — percutaneous endoscopic
  • D. The qualifier

Answer key 1. **C** — the coded record's MS-DRG; charges and days are not the payment basis. 2. **B** — October 1, 1983 (Social Security Amendments of 1983). 3. **C** — the UHDDS definition; "after study" and "occasioning the admission" carry the weight. 4. **B** — established after study; the symptom is what the patient brought, the infarction is what the workup found. 5. **B** — the inpatient uncertain-diagnosis rule (Ch. 9 §9.5); the outpatient setting is the opposite. 6. **The Uniform Hospital Discharge Data Set (UHDDS).** 7. **B** — the single highest-severity secondary sets the tier. 8. **C** — nothing; severity does not stack. (It may still belong on the claim for CMI, quality, and risk-adjustment purposes.) 9. **B** — annually, in the IPPS final rule. 10. **B** — pre-MDC check, MDC from the principal diagnosis, surgical partition, severity split. 11. **B** — an OR-designated ICD-10-PCS code; the designation belongs to CMS's tables, not the room. 12. **B** — 6,200.00 × 0.8003 = \$4,961.86. 13. **B** — the MCC's value: one documented phrase, J96.01, DRG 190 versus 191. 14. **C** — the wage index of the hospital's labor market. 15. **B** — average relative weight of discharges; at a fixed base rate, revenue per case. 16. **Patients genuinely sicker (service/acuity mix) versus documentation and coding capturing more of the severity that was always there.** The CMI measures records, not patients. 17. **A** — Y; conditions arising before the inpatient admission order count as present on admission. 18. **B** — U is treated like N (resolved against the hospital); W like Y (the clinician's honest uncertainty is honored). 19. **C** — the provision removes the HAC's severity credit, but another POA = Y MCC already holds the tier; the payment does not move. 20. **B** — skew resistance; the GMLOS sits where the typical case lives. 21. **B** — per diem 9,300 ÷ 5 = 1,860.00; day 1 doubled 3,720.00; + 1,860.00 + 1,860.00 = \$7,440.00. 22. **The per-diem total is capped at the full DRG payment — a transferring hospital is never paid more than a discharging one.** 23. **B** — all of a body part (with the PCS body-part definitions doing the work); Excision is a portion. 24. **C** — character 5 of the code is the approach; the value 4 is percutaneous endoscopic.