The Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange (WEDI) has released a white paper to help small providers with ICD-10 testing.
The white paper, by WEDI’s ICD-10 Testing subworkgroup, provides physician practices with a starting point for ICD-10 testing by focusing on primary considerations and steps for external testing with payers to ensure compliance with the Oct. 1, 2015 implementation date.
In regards to small providers specifically, research from the Professional Association of Health Care Office Management, published recently in the Journal of the American Health Information Management Association, found that ICD-10 expenditures will not be as significant as once estimated. The results found that the surveyed practices spent an average of $8,167 on ICD-10 implementation, while individual providers spent an average of $3,430. According to the researchers in that study, there are now three studies documenting that ICD-10 implementation costs in small physician practices are dramatically lower than originally reported in the widely publicized American Medical Association (AMA)-funded study, which estimated the cost for a small practice to implement ICD-10 was in the range of $22,560-$105,506.
Nonetheless, for small provider organizations, there are various challenges that this paper attempts to address. “For many small provider organizations, the uncertainties surrounding the impending ICD-10 transition can be daunting. For this reason, the ICD-10 subworkgroup has structured the paper as an easy-to-follow instructional guide, addressing the who, what, where, when, why and how of the testing process,” Devin Jopp, president and CEO, WEDI, said in a statement.
