Newsletter - Page 4

The American Dental Association’s Code Maintenance Committee (CMC) is responsible for maintaining the Code on Dental Procedures and Terminology (CDT) code set. The committee meets annually and is charged with evaluating all submitted code change requests. The CMC votes to accept, amend, or decline each request based on the best interests of the dental profession, patients, and third-party payers and administrators.

The 2021 Code Maintenance Committee (CMC) has finalized the Current Dental Terminology (CDT) for 2022. The action of the CMC included 46 total changes: 16 additions, 14 revisions, 6 deletions, and 10 editorial changes. One deletion included an entire subcategory. All dental claims for services performed between January 1 and December 31, 2022, must utilize the appropriate code from the new CDT 2022 to meet HIPAA requirements. CDT 2022 goes into effect January 1, 2022.

Current Dental Terminology (CDT) is a procedure code set that provides a uniform, consistent, and specific method of documenting and submitting dental procedures to dental payers. In addition, CDT codes provide an efficient way to process dental claims and populate electronic health records. CDT is a standard HIPAA code set. Any dental claim submitted must use dental procedure codes from the most current version of CDT.