L04.0 — Acute lymphadenitis of face, head and neck
L04.0 is a billable, specific ICD-10-CM code for acute lymphadenitis of face, head and neck. It is valid for submission on a claim.
Excludes1 inherited from the categories above L04.0
These are not written on L04.0, but they bind it: a note on a category applies to every code beneath it. Billing L04.0 with anything listed here is a denial.
Other codes that can never be billed with L04.0
These codes carry an Excludes1 note pointing at L04.0. The conflict binds both ways, but ICD-10-CM only writes it down on one side — so you would not find this by reading L04.0 alone.
Risk adjustment
L04.0 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
L04.0 is named in 5 Medicare coverage policies — 5 listing it as supporting medical necessity. Which of them applies to you depends on your Medicare contractor, and coverage genuinely differs by state.
- A53058Billing and Coding: Home Health Physical Therapy
- A53064Billing and Coding: Outpatient Occupational Therapy
- A56775Billing and Coding: Magnetic Resonance Angiography
- A57204Billing and Coding: MRI and CT Scans of the Head and Neck
How L04.0 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 L04.0.
- Infection, infected, infective›cervical gland(lymph)
- Abscess›cervical›lymph gland or node
- Abscess›neck›lymph gland or node
- Adenitis›cervical›acute
- Lymphadenitis›acute›face
- Lymphadenitis›acute›head
- Lymphadenitis›acute›neck
Code history
L04.0 has not changed since FY2024 — no addition, revision or deletion across the three most recent ICD-10-CM releases.
Related codes at this level
Codes that share L04. If L04.0 is not quite right, the correct code is usually one of these.
Questions about L04.0
- Is L04.0 a billable ICD-10-CM code?
- Yes. L04.0 is a billable, specific ICD-10-CM code and is valid for submission on a claim.
- Where does L04.0 sit in the tabular list?
- Diseases of the skin and subcutaneous tissue (L00-L99), in the block Infections of the skin and subcutaneous tissue (L00-L08).
- What cannot be coded together with L04.0?
- L04.0 carries Excludes1 notes, which means the conditions they list can never be coded together with it on the same encounter. Some are written on the categories above L04.0 (L04) and apply to it just the same.