On October 1, 2016, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) will end its year-long ICD-10 “grace period.” This Medicare ICD-10 flexibilities period was instituted to help ease the transition to the new coding requirements adopted last year. On October 1, 2016, all diagnosis coding must be to the correct level of specificity. Claims […]
CMS Publishes New FAQs Regarding ICD-10 Flexibilities
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has published new frequently asked questions (FAQs) and responses pertaining to guidance regarding ICD-10 flexibilities. The new questions and responses specifically address expiration of Medicare flexibilities. They are as follows: Q: When will the Medicare ICD-10 flexibilities expire? A: The ICD-10 flexibilities expire on October 1, 2016. […]
AHIMA Pushes for Revisions to New ICD-10 Codes
As we previously discussed, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention indicated they will add about 1,900 diagnosis codes and more than 3,600 hospital inpatient procedure codes to the ICD-10 coding system. After these codes are finalized, they will go into effect October 1. Now the American Health […]
Ready to Prepare for ICD-10 Again? Thousands of New Codes are Coming.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have announced they will add about 1,900 diagnosis codes and more than 3,600 hospital inpatient procedure codes to the ICD-10 coding system for claims in FY 2017. To access the new procedure coding system codes, visit the CMS website. […]
ICD-10 ‘Next Steps’ Toolkit: Free Download
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has released an “ICD-10 Next Steps for Providers Assessment & Maintenance Toolkit.” The toolkit is intended to help providers track and improve ICD-10 progress with information and resources. Areas of focus include: Assessing your ICD-10 progress using key performance indicators (KPIs) to identify potential issues that could […]
CMS Reviews Qualifiers for ICD-10 Diagnosis Codes on Electronic Claims
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has issued a reminder about how healthcare providers should use qualifiers for ICD-10 diagnosis codes submitted on electronic claims. CMS notes that when you submit electronic claims for services, remember the following: Claims with ICD-10 diagnosis codes must use ICD-10 qualifiers; all claims for services on or […]
CMS Denies 10% of ICD-10 Claims
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has announced it rejected 10.1% of Medicare fee-for-service claims submitted October 1-27, 2015, with the new ICD-10 codes. On October 1, 2015, health systems transitioned to ICD-10. Between October 1-27, CMS processed 4.6 million claims per day, a similar figure as compared to its historical baseline. It […]
ICYMI: PGM Publishes ICD-10 Code Crosswalks
Last week, PGM Billing announced it had published crosswalks of ICD-9 to ICD-10 codes for more than a dozen specialties. Each crosswalk includes some of the most frequently used ICD-9 codes converted to their ICD-10 equivalent(s). The specialties crosswalked are as follows: Allergy Anesthesia Cardiology Chiropractic Dermatology Emergency Medicine Gastroenterology Mental Health Nephrology Orthopedics (upper […]
Top 5 ICD-10 Benefits
It’s a little more than a month until the October 1 deadline for the implementation of ICD-10. While the transition to ICD-10 requires a great deal of work — and carries with it substantial risks, as we previously discussed — there are also a number of benefits of switching from ICD-9 to ICD-10. As Sue […]
Top 5 ICD-10 Risks
The October 1 deadline for the implementation of ICD-10 is rapidly approaching, and that may be very bad news for many providers. A recent survey by the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange (WEDI) found that only about 20% of physician practices have started or completed external ICD-10 testing and less than 50% indicated they were […]