On Tuesday, the Medical Group Management Association sent a letter to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius urging CMS to conduct ICD-10 testing with outside organizations, FierceHealthIT reports (Bowman, FierceHealthIT, 7/23).
U.S. health care organizations are working to transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10 code sets to accommodate codes for new diseases and procedures. The switch from ICD-9 to ICD-10 code sets means that health care providers and insurers will have to change out about 14,000 codes for about 69,000 codes.
In August 2012, HHS released a final rule that officially delayed the ICD-10 compliance date from Oct. 1, 2013, to Oct. 1, 2014, partially to look at the incremental changes needed in reforming health care.
There were rumors that CMS had decided not to conduct “external, end-to-end” testing with outside organizations for ICD-10 claims flows.
During an HHS National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics Subcommittee on Standards hearing in June, Cathy Carter — director of the business applications management group in CMS’ office of information services — said, “I don’t believe there was ever a plan [for Medicaid administrative contractors] to test with providers all the way through.” Carter said, “The announcement everyone is talking about wasn’t really an announcement.”
She said that CMS officials have informally agreed to discuss the issue in response to negative comments but expressed little optimism that CMS would change its plans, citing a lack of funding and time (iHealthBeat, 6/20).
In the letter, MGMA President and CEO Susan Turney said she is “extremely concerned” about CMS’ decision, adding that outside testing could help to avoid a potential “catastrophic back-log of Medicare claims” after the Oct. 1, 2014 compliance date (FierceHealthIT, 7/23).
Turney wrote, “ICD-10 will be one of the most significant changes the physician practice community has ever undertaken — impacting both the clinical and administrative sides of every care delivery organization,” adding, “End-to-end testing between trading partners is absolutely critical to measure operational predictability and readiness, and also to identify any roadblocks well in advance of the compliance date.”
She added, “Failure to do so could result in significant cash flow disruption for physicians and their practices, and serious access to care issues for Medicare patients.”
The letter concluded, “We believe it is imperative that you address this concern without delay and direct Medicare to conduct ICD-10 end-to-end testing with all external trading partners” (Goedert, Health Data Management, 7/23).
Source: iHealthBeat
Comments are closed.
Copyright 2015 - Pulse Practice Solutions | 615.425.2719