What is the difference between HCPCS and CPT?

CPT stands for Current Procedural Terminology. It is a code maintained by the American Medical Association through the CPT Editorial Panel, and it was created to illustrate medical, surgical, and diagnostic services accurately.

It is also used as a uniform communication method among physicians, coders, patients, accreditation, organizations, and those who pay for administrative, financial, and diagnostic purposes about certain medical practices and services. On the contrary, the Healthcare Common Procedure Coding System.

It is a group of healthcare procedure codes based on CPT. It was created to give a standardized coding system to explain specific items and services provided when healthcare is delivered. It is a required form of coding for anyone who has Medicare, Medicaid, and other health insurance programs to safeguard that insurance claims are processed efficiently.

CPT or Current Procedural Terminology is a set of codes formed by the American Medical Association. This code set was designed by the Editorial Panel of CPT so that specialists can use them to describe certain services such as diagnostic, surgical, and other medical processes. It was designed to ensure that medical personnel can communicate effectively with other people, most importantly about certain medical processes. HCPCS or Healthcare Common Procedure Coding System, on the other hand, is a coding system that is used in CPT or Current Procedural Terminology. HCPCS was designed for the description of all services provided and materials used when a patient is receiving treatment. People who use health insurance programs such as Medicaid, Medicare, and others are advised to understand the HCPCS. Since CPT is the intellectual property of the AMA, you will need to pay a license fee before you can own a copy. On the contrary, HCPCS can be used by anybody without paying for it.

When you say CPT, this means that you are referring to some of the services that are available in the medical field. HCPCS, on the other hand, are meant to create codes that are based on the CPT. The main goal of using HCPCS is to ensure that standardized coding will be applied to avoid possible confusion in the long run. You might think that HCPS and CPT are the same things in the beginning but they are not the same. CPT is used for reporting different medical procedures and services while HCPCS will contain the different codes that can make people identify the CPTs faster.