ICD-10-CM › M00-M99 › M50-M54 › M51 Thoracic, thoracolumbar, and... › M51.9
Unspecified thoracic, thoracolumbar and lumbosacral intervertebral disc disorder
ValidICD-10-CM diagnosis code.
Valid for claims with a date of service in the current code year.
What has happened to this code
Every change the publisher made, from 2007 to now. Entries marked draft are from the pre-implementation releases: ICD-10 took effect on 1 October 2015, so nothing before FY2016 was ever valid on a claim.
- FY2007 Added to the draft code set draft Unspecified thoracic, thoracolumbar and lumbosacral intervertebral disc disorder
Official coding rules
Published by CDC for FY2027. A rule attached to a category binds every code beneath it, so the rules inherited from this code's ancestors are shown with the code they come from.
Inherited from M51 Thoracic, thoracolumbar, and lumbosacral intervertebral disc disorders
Excludes2 - not included here
- cervical and cervicothoracic disc disorders (M50.-)
- sacral and sacrococcygeal disorders (M53.3)
Inherited from the M50-M54 section Other dorsopathies (M50-M54)
Excludes1 - never coded here
- current injury - see injury of spine by body region
- discitis NOS (M46.4-)
How CDC's index refers to this code
Wording from the official alphabetic index. Much of it appears nowhere in the code description, which is why a search for the everyday phrase so often finds nothing.
- Disease, diseased > nucleus pulposus
- Disease, diseased > intervertebral disc
- Disease, diseased > vertebra, vertebral > disc
- Inflammation, inflamed, inflammatory > nerve NEC
- Defect, defective > intervertebral annular fibrosis
- Disorder > disc
- Neuritis > due to > herniation, nucleus pulposus
- Defect, defective > intervertebral annular fibrosis
Codes in the same group
| Code | Description | Status |
|---|---|---|
| M51.0 | Thoracic, thoracolumbar and lumbosacral intervertebral disc disorders with myelopathy | Not billable |
| M51.1 | Thoracic, thoracolumbar and lumbosacral intervertebral disc disorders with radiculopathy | Not billable |
| M51.2 | Other thoracic, thoracolumbar and lumbosacral intervertebral disc displacement | Not billable |
| M51.3 | Other thoracic, thoracolumbar and lumbosacral intervertebral disc degeneration | Not billable |
| M51.4 | Schmorl's nodes | Not billable |
| M51.8 | Other thoracic, thoracolumbar and lumbosacral intervertebral disc disorders | Not billable |
| M51.A | Other lumbar and lumbosacral annulus fibrosus disc defects | Not billable |