What is the difference between ICD-9 and ICD-10?
Why ICD-10 codes are important
The ICD-9 is an acronym for "International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems 9th Revision." This ninth edition is a publication from the World Health Organization comprising a set of codes that are used worldwide to classify diseases and injuries. Use
Unspecified diagnosis codes like U09.9 are acceptable when clinical information is unknown or not available about a particular condition. Although a more specific code is preferable, unspecified codes should be used when such codes most accurately reflect what is known about a patient's condition.
The biggest difference between the two code structures is that ICD-9 had 14,4000 codes, while ICD-10 contains over 69,823. ICD-10 codes consists of three to seven characters, while ICD-9 contained three to five digits.
Most ICD-9 codes are three digits to the left of a decimal point and one or two digits to the right of one. For example: 250.0 is diabetes with no complications. 530.81 is gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD).
In a concise statement, ICD-9 is the code used to describe the condition or disease being treated, also known as the diagnosis. CPT is the code used to describe the treatment and diagnostic services provided for that diagnosis.
A primary user of ICD codes includes health care personnel, such as physicians and nurses, as well as medical coders, who assign ICD-9-CM codes to verbatim or abstracted diagnosis or procedure information, and thus are originators of the ICD codes.
International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD) ICD serves a broad range of uses globally and provides critical knowledge on the extent, causes and consequences of human disease and death worldwide via data that is reported and coded with the ICD.
The International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM) is the U.S. health system's adaptation of international ICD-9 standard list of six-character alphanumeric codes to describe diagnoses.
For a medical provider to receive reimbursement for medical services, ICD-10-CM codes are required to be submitted to the payer. While CPT® codes depict the services provided to the patient, ICD-10-CM codes depict the patient's diagnoses that justify the services rendered as medically necessary.
Encounter Codes should be always coded as primary diagnosis All the encounter codes should be coded as first listed or primary diagnosis followed by all the secondary diagnosis. For example, if a patient comes for chemotherapy for neoplasm, then the admit diagnosis, ROS and primary diagnosis will be coded as Z51.
In addition to billing, ICD-10 codes will be used to advance the science of healthcare including nursing. Nursing's role in data collection and entry is important in the building of the ICD-10 database.
ICD-9 follows an outdated 1970's medical coding system which fails to capture detailed health care data and is inconsistent with current medical practice. By transitioning to ICD-10, providers will have: Improved operational processes by classifying detail within codes to accurately process payments and reimbursements.
International Classification of Diseases,Ninth Revision (ICD-9) The International Classification of Diseases (ICD) is designed to promote international comparability in the collection, processing, classification, and presentation of mortality statistics. This includes providing a format for reporting causes of death on the death certificate.
The combination of underlying and nonunderlying causes is the multiple causes of death. The ICD has been revised periodically to incorporate changes in the medical field. To date, there have been 10 revisions of the ICD.
introduced its own classification and coding rules for Human immunodeficiency virus infection (HIV) mortality effective with the 1987 data year (see the Technical Appendix of Vital Statistics of the United States). The ICD-9 is no longer available in print. Volume I, modified for U.S. purposes, is available.