In a perfect world the expectation is the hospitalist that receives the query concurrently answers it when he receives it. This often happens since we have instituted a no response audit and track the number of times a query is sent and to whom. Our hospitalists typically change on Tuesday. So the hospitalist that receives the query on Monday should answer. If they do not, we resend the query to the hospitalist picking up the case and it becomes his responsibility to respond. This often does no sit well with the hospitalist picking up the case since his colleague did not follow through. If it is a case of a different hospitalist discharging the case, the back end query goes to the discharging hospitalist.
My organization follows the same process as "lolly102412" explained above. This does create great frustration for the new hospitalist. We have found cases in which the new hospitalist will reply with "I did not document this diagnosis...Please ask the provider who documented this." In that case, the question goes back to the documenting provider, unless the new provider begins copying and pasting the original provider's notes, which happens quite often. Then, the responsibility to clarify the documentation becomes the new provider's. I have seen coding repost outstanding queries to the provider who writes the discharge summary, especially if he or she included the diagnosis in question.
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My organization follows the same process as "lolly102412" explained above. This does create great frustration for the new hospitalist. We have found cases in which the new hospitalist will reply with "I did not document this diagnosis...Please ask the provider who documented this." In that case, the question goes back to the documenting provider, unless the new provider begins copying and pasting the original provider's notes, which happens quite often. Then, the responsibility to clarify the documentation becomes the new provider's. I have seen coding repost outstanding queries to the provider who writes the discharge summary, especially if he or she included the diagnosis in question.