Report Makes ICD-10 Implementation Recommendations

HIMSS G7 is a World Bank-endorsed thought leadership group that meets three times a year to address financial viability and futures of key Health IT initiatives. This includes ICD-10 transition and  implementation. In August HHS released the Final Rule delaying ICD-10 compliance until October 1, 2014.  The transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10 code sets means providers and insurers will have to switch out the current 14,000 codes for 70,000.

The Group recently released its advisory report Implementing ICD-10 by the Compliance Date: A Call to Action. The report lays out recommendations to achieve compliance and adoption of ICD-10 by its new deadline date of October 1, 2014.

To make this new compliance deadline the Group recommends the following:

1. Achieve broad stakeholder support for an ICD-10 Pilot Program with end-to-end business
process testing.
2. Accelerate vendor readiness supporting health plans, providers, and other vendors.
3. Significantly expand education focused on independent physician groups and providers.
4. Recognize the Cooperating Parties, which include the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services
(CMS), National Center for Health Statistics, (NCH, American Hospital Association (AHA), and American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) as the “single source of truth” for accurate and consistent coding.

The report gives detail on “call to actions” that must be made including one significantly affecting small-to-mid-size practices. From the report:

Significantly Expand Education Focused on Independent, Physician Group Practices
As noted in the “burning platform” section of this Call to Action, a lack of comprehensive awareness of both the value of ICD-10 and the implementation requirements exists among small and mid-sized providers. The HIMSS G7 calls for actively engaging at least 20% of such providers by December 31, 2012. To accomplish this, HIMSS G7 commits to providing comprehensive, credible educational tools and resources for use by medical by medical specialty societies, ONC Regional Extension Centers (RECs),  and practice management vendors.

Read the full HIMSS G7 report here. Learn more about HIMSS G7 here.