Q: When you have a fracture of the tibia and the fracture extends from the shaft into the distal bone how do you code? In this situation, it is one fracture that is branching out over multiple areas of the same bone, not to be confused with multiple separate fractures.

A: One fracture line gets only one code. Think of the most severe or important code you want to capture. If the line extends to the articular surface (an intraarticular fracture) we would code it there. If it just goes into the metaphysis but doesn”t involve the joint surface, code to the shaft.