ICD-10 code S61.314S: Right ring finger laceration sequela

Key takeaways

ICD-10 code S61.314S is a billable code for the late effects of a right ring finger laceration with nail damage.

The 7th character S applies once the original wound has healed and a late effect brings the patient back.

Sequela claims carry two codes, with the late-effect condition listed first and S61.314S second.

Nail dystrophy, scar contracture, and lasting sensory changes are the sequelae that bring these patients back.

There is no time limit on a sequela, so healing status decides the 7th character, not the calendar.

ICD-10 code S61.314S covers a laceration without foreign body of the right ring finger with damage to nail, sequela. It’s billable, and the S on the end is the part tells the payer the original wound has healed. What you’re treating now is what the injury left behind, like a ridged nail or a tight scar.

Swap in D and you’ve said the wound is still open, which is a different claim entirely. The rest is documentation, and that’s where sequela claims usually fall apart.

S61.314S is billable, but only after the wound has healed

S61.314S is a billable, specific ICD-10-CM code, valid for HIPAA-covered transactions. It sits in the 2026 code edition, which took effect October 1, 2025.

The official description reads: Laceration without foreign body of right ring finger with damage to nail, sequela. Nothing more is needed to make it valid, because it already carries its 7th character.

Codes move every October, so check the status before you rely on it. The CDC ICD-10-CM web tool mirrors the official annual release. CMS publishes the full code files and the official guidelines for each fiscal year alongside it.

The 7th character S marks a late effect, not active care

The 7th character separates three clinically different encounters that all involve the same injury. For S61.314S that character is S, which stands for sequela.

Official guidelines define a sequela as a late effect that arises as a direct result of an earlier condition. The wound itself is finished. What’s left is the complication it caused.

Sequela coding almost always takes two codes. S61.314S names the injury behind the problem. A second code names the condition you’re treating today, such as a nail disorder or a scar.

Sequence the late-effect condition first and S61.314S second, per Section I.B.10 of the official guidelines.

A, D, or S? Healing status decides, not the calendar

The line between a subsequent encounter and a sequela is healing status, nothing else.

Say a patient cuts the right ring finger deep enough to damage the nail matrix. Three weeks later they come back for a wound check, and that visit is S61.314D. Six months later the nail grows back ridged and sore, and that visit is S61.314S.

• Use S61.314A while the fresh laceration is under active treatment. That covers the emergency department, urgent care, and the specialist’s first look.
• Use S61.314D for follow-up visits while healing is still in progress, including wound checks, suture removal, and post-op reviews.
• Use S61.314S only after the wound has fully healed, when the visit exists because of a late-effect condition.

The same encounter logic runs through the whole injury chapter, though fracture codes such as S82.026P draw on a wider 7th-character set.

If you want to see the three variants of this code side by side, the AAPC code lookup lists them together.

Where S61.314S sits in the S61 family tree

S61.314S is the most specific code available for this injury and this encounter type. Reading the hierarchy from the top confirms there’s nothing further down to choose.

The siblings sitting alongside it in the S61.31x series all describe lacerations without foreign body, with damage to nail:

• S61.310x – Right index finger, with 7th character variants A, D, and S
• S61.311x – Left index finger
• S61.312x – Right middle finger
• S61.313x – Left middle finger
• S61.314x – Right ring finger, the family S61.314S belongs to
• S61.315x – Left ring finger
• S61.316x – Right little finger
• S61.317x – Left little finger
• S61.318x – Other finger with damage to nail

One boundary is worth marking. If the finger was lost rather than cut, the injury leaves S61 altogether and takes an amputation code such as S68.612S.

Nail dystrophy and scar contracture are the sequelae you’ll see most

A laceration without foreign body means torn soft tissue with nothing left inside the wound. With nail damage, the hit usually lands on the nail matrix, the nail bed, or the skin around the nail.

Blades, crush injuries, and traumatic nail avulsion are the common mechanisms. The repair itself often bills as something like CPT code 12051.

By the time S61.314S applies, that wound is closed. The patient is back because of what the injury left behind:

• Nail dystrophy – abnormal regrowth from matrix scarring, giving a thickened, ridged, or split nail plate
• Permanent nail loss – no regrowth at all, because the matrix was destroyed
• Scar contracture – fibrous tissue limiting movement at the distal interphalangeal joint
• Sensory change – numbness, hypersensitivity, or neuroma at the fingertip after nerve involvement
• Chronic pain – lasting discomfort where scar tissue presses on the digital nerve

These problems rarely come back to whoever repaired the wound. Nail changes surface later in dermatology practices, while stiffness lands with hand and occupational therapists. Both need the original injury date on file.

That’s why the causal link belongs in the record rather than in someone’s memory.

Four visits where S61.314S is the right call

Three things have to be true before you reach for this code. The laceration has healed, the current visit treats a condition that injury caused, and the note ties the two together. These are the encounters where all three usually line up.

• Dermatology or hand surgery follow-up. The patient wants an opinion on a thickened or dystrophic nail, traced back to a laceration repaired three months earlier.
• Occupational health review. A worker is cleared for return to duty. Numbness in the fingertip is recorded as a late effect of the original workplace injury.
• Hand therapy referral. Scar contracture limits movement at the distal joint, and the referral arrives long after the wound closed.
• Pain management consultation. Fingertip pain and hypersensitivity point to neuroma formation at the site of the earlier laceration.

In every one of these, the late-effect condition leads the claim. Nail dystrophy, for example, is coded as L60.3 in the first position. S61.314S follows it to explain where the dystrophy came from.

Four guideline rules that keep an S61.314S claim clean

Section I.B.10 of the ICD-10-CM Official Guidelines for Coding and Reporting governs sequela coding. Four rules do most of the work.

• No time limit applies. A sequela is defined by healed status, not by how many weeks or months have passed since the injury.
• Sequence the condition first. Code the late effect you’re treating today, then S61.314S for the injury behind it.
• Bring the external cause forward. External cause codes use the same 7th-character system as the injury code. A subsequent-encounter code like V69.40XD has an S counterpart for sequela claims.
• Keep active wound care off the claim. While the wound is still healing, S61.314D is the code, and S61.314S has no place on that encounter.

S61.314S carries no Excludes1 or Excludes2 note of its own. The broader S61 category does carry two Excludes1 notes worth knowing about. Traumatic amputation of the wrist and hand belongs in S68.-. An open fracture of the wrist, hand, or finger takes S62.- with 7th character B.

The note carries the burden here. It has to show the original injury, the condition you’re treating now, and the physician’s statement joining the two.

How a sequela claim moves from note to payment

A sequela claim travels the same route as any other, but it leans harder on the clinical note. Everything downstream depends on the provider writing, in that day’s note, that the current problem came from the old laceration.

From there the sequence is short. The coder lists the late-effect condition first and S61.314S second. Billing builds the CMS-1500 and pushes it through a medical claims clearinghouse. That clearinghouse validates the file’s format and routes it to the payer.

Front-end edits catch most problems before a payer ever sees them. A clean claim check flags a missing second diagnosis or a code that doesn’t match the place of service. Whatever slips past shows up weeks later as a denial code on the remittance.

Before you submit, run this five-point check

1. The note names the original injury and states that the wound has healed.
2. The provider explicitly links today’s condition to that injury.
3. The late-effect condition sits in the first diagnosis position, with S61.314S second.
4. No active wound-care code appears anywhere on the same claim.
5. Laterality matches the note, right ring finger rather than left.

Four mistakes that stall an S61.314S claim

1. Reaching for D out of habit. On a healed wound, D tells the payer a story the note doesn’t support.
2. Submitting S61.314S alone. Without the late-effect condition, the claim describes an injury and gives no reason for today’s visit.
3. Reversing the sequence. S61.314S in first position reads as though you’re treating the laceration itself.
4. Missing the filing window. Sequela visits often land months after the injury, and timely filing limits run from the date of service.

A denied sequela claim is usually recoverable, because the fix is a documentation problem rather than a coding one. Good denial management sends it back to the provider for an addendum, then rebills it with the causal statement in place.

How Pabau keeps sequela coding tied to the record

Most practices split this work across two systems. The clinical note lives in the patient record, and the diagnosis codes get keyed again into a separate billing tool. When a claim depends on one sentence in that note, the retyping step is where the link gets lost.

Pabau is an all-in-one practice management system, so the encounter and the claim sit in the same place. Its claims management software seeds the diagnosis fields on the claim form from what’s recorded against the patient. A full ICD-10-CM lookup library sits behind the search box. Required fields have to be complete before the claim can be sent.

US claims go out through the Claim.MD integration, with eligibility checks, claim status, and remittance posting handled in the same screen. Six months later, the coder can open the original encounter and read exactly what was written at the time.

Keep diagnosis codes attached to the encounter that earned them

Pabau puts the clinical note, the diagnosis codes, and the claim in one system, so nothing has to be retyped between them. Fewer keying errors means fewer sequela claims coming back.

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Conclusion

The whole code turns on one question. Has the wound healed? If it has, and the patient is back because of what it left behind, S61.314S is right. If the wound is still closing, the code is S61.314D, and no amount of elapsed time changes that.

Get the causal sentence into the note and the rest of the claim follows on its own. Skip it, and you’ll spend an afternoon appealing a denial that one line of documentation would have prevented. Book a demo to see how Pabau keeps your diagnosis codes and your clinical notes on the same page.

Continue your research

Coding a laceration somewhere other than the hand? S86.921A walks through laceration coding for the lower leg and how the 7th character changes the claim.

Chasing numbness after an injury? S94.20XA covers nerve injury coding, which often sits behind the sensory sequelae described above.

Billing the procedure as well as the diagnosis? CPT code 25676 shows how a hand and wrist procedure is documented and billed alongside its diagnosis.

Want a visit summary that holds what coders need? Patient visit summary gives you a structure that keeps injury history and current findings in one place.

Tracking pain between follow-ups? Pain journal template gives patients a simple way to record symptoms that a sequela visit will need.

Frequently asked questions