K70.9 — Alcoholic liver disease, unspecified
K70.9 is a billable, specific ICD-10-CM code for alcoholic liver disease, unspecified. It is valid for submission on a claim.
Risk adjustment
K70.9 does not map to an HCC and does not risk-adjust under CMS-HCC V28. That is normal — most ICD-10 codes do not. It still needs to be coded correctly; it just will not move a RAF score.
Medicare coverage
K70.9 is named in 3 Medicare coverage policies — 3 listing it as supporting medical necessity. Which of them applies to you depends on your Medicare contractor, and coverage genuinely differs by state.
- A56421Billing and Coding: CT of the Abdomen and Pelvis
- A57063Billing and Coding: Diagnostic and Therapeutic Esophagogastroduodenoscopy
- A57361Billing and Coding: Monitored Anesthesia Care
How K70.9 is indexed
Coders do not find codes by browsing the tabular list — they look them up in the alphabetic index, under the word the physician wrote. These are the index entries that lead here, so you can see which chart wordings map to K70.9.
- Alcohol, alcoholic, alcohol-induced›liver
- Damage›liver›alcoholic
- Disease, diseased›liver›alcoholic(chronic)
Related codes at this level
Codes that share K70. If K70.9 is not quite right, the correct code is usually one of these.
Questions about K70.9
- Is K70.9 a billable ICD-10-CM code?
- Yes. K70.9 is a billable, specific ICD-10-CM code and is valid for submission on a claim.
- Where does K70.9 sit in the tabular list?
- Diseases of the digestive system (K00-K95), in the block Diseases of liver (K70-K77).