Industry Associations Debate Whether to Delay ICD-10
Robert Wah, M.D.Since the passage of the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act/Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (ARRA-HITECH) Act, a lot is being asked of physicians, says Dr. Wah, like tackling meaningful use requirements, and participating in patient-centered medical homes, accountable care organizations, and health insurance exchanges. With all these healthcare quality initiatives, AMA sees ICD-10 as only adding administrative expense and creating unnecessary workflow disruptions.Another reason for AMA’s opposition to ICD-10 is the financial investment for physicians for the implementation, and as Wah says, a “lack of return on investment”. AMA cited a 2008 study as context that found that a small three-physician practice would need to spend $83,290 to implement ICD-10, and a 10-physician practice would spend $285,195 to make the coding change. “Physicians are seeing that maybe other people, the payers, the government, maybe research, will get a return on changing over to ICD-10, but physicians and patients have to make the investments,” says Wah. “Here someone else gets the return, and you have to make the investment; that’s hard to square.”In response to AMA’s opposition, the American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) on November 16 voiced its disappointment and encouraged the industry to move forward to comply with the original deadline, Oct. 1, 2013.“We believe that ICD-10 is essential for a lot of the initiatives we’re moving forward with today because we need more up-to-date, contemporary healthcare data,” says Sue Bowman, director, Coding Policy and Compliance, AHIMA. “The data that gets externally reported and is used for analysis is in ICD-9 codes that is over 30 years old now. The structure is not designed for today’s medical care or demands for more detailed and specific data.”