4 debatable points on the delay of ICD-10 from HealthIT.com

Fighting words were heard from both sides of the ICD-10 debate after the AMA called for a delay of the Oct. 1, 2013 deadline for conversion. LinkedIn and Twitter were bustling with yea or nay responses, which is why we asked Steve Sisko, IT consultant and avid ICD-10 blogger, and Rob Tennant, senior policy advisor at the MGMA, to weigh in.

1. The effect ICD-10 implementation will have on physician practices.

Sisko:

It won’t be as bad as they think. According to Sisko, some practices will be burdened more than others with the switch to ICD-10. “But specialists only need to learn a subset [of codes],” he added. “They say ’70,000 ICD codes we’ll have to know,’ well, that’s BS because if you’re an orthopedic surgeon, there are subsets you don’t need to know; you don’t need to learn about other specialties’ codes.” He added, though, facilities will be impacted to a greater extent than professionals, due to the fact institutions have to collect, “Present on Admission and discharge diagnosis that professionals do not have to collect. They’ll have to lean on existing resources or hire external assistance.”

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Report: ICD-10 presents challenges, opportunities for CMS from HealthCare IT

WASHINGTON – The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has its work cut out in transitioning to ICD-10. As the largest payer and the force driving the new code sets in the United States, CMS has a task at least as intimidating as anyone else when it comes to implementation.

“Given the extent to which the code set is built into many business and operating processes and systems, the size of CMS operations, and the complexity of its systems,” the challenges CMS faces are indeed formidable, according to a report published last week from the National Research Council, which CMS assigned to help it better understand how to modernize CMS’ own IT.

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