With the ICD 10 deadline approaching fast, are you ready for it?
Firstly, let’s do a recap on what ICD 10 is. The International Classification of Diseases (ICD) is a standard system for the classification of diseases. This is published by the World Health Organization (WHO). The system uses coding to classify and identify diseases and health problems. ICD 10 is not just a simple update to the ICD 9 system, which is currently being phased out, it is different from the ICD 9 system in that it is more specific, it has a larger number of codes (from 15,000 codes to 150,000 codes), it uses longer codes, as well as other variations.
I mentioned the ICD 10 deadline earlier, let us discuss that. The World Health Organization has set a deadline for all medical practitioners to have completely implemented the ICD 10 system. As you can imagine, this is a huge task, and it is not something that can happen overnight. Since the ICD 10 coding system is so much more complex, in order for any practitioners to adapt to that level of change, you need to set plenty of time for putting the system into effect. In other words, in order to meet the deadline, you have to have started already or be ready to start as soon as possible.
The deadline for ICD 10 is set at October 2014. This deadline was delayed once already and officials claim that it will not be delayed further. The deadline being delayed was due to various problems, one of the big ones being that there was just a really big lack of qualified coders to undertake this system change. Medical workers also need to be trained in using ICD 10, so the industry will need more coders to make up for the decline in productivity while the training takes place.
As we know, October 2014 is not too far from now, so professional medical coders are in huge demand right now, and will continue to be so at least until this deadline. This means that if you were considering learning ICD 10 coding, now would be an excellent time to do so, since the demand is extremely high and will continue to be for most of 2014 and beyond that too. This demand naturally means that it will result in a better salary and a more prosperous career. Before the ICD 10 coding system even began to become implemented, it was estimated that medical billing and coding jobs covered one fifth of the entire medical profession. Now that the ICD 10 coding system is being put into place, this figure is expected to grow substantially. This is because the ICD 10 coding system is a lot more time consuming and complicated.
To sum up this article, ICD 10 is the future of medical coding, and it is vital for anyone in the medical field to know about it. It is even more essential for medical coders and potential medical coders to take this opportunity to advance your career and learn the ICD 10 system as soon as possible to make your mark before anybody else. The effort and time that you put in now will make a huge and positive change for you and your patients once you start with ICD 10.