Dive Brief:
- CMS announced it accepted 88% of claims in its second round of ICD-10 testing, up from 81% in its initial testing round.
- There were 23,138 test claims submitted, of which 20,306 were accepted. CMS reported that 2% of test claims were rejected due to invalid ICD-10 diagnosis or procedure codes and less than 1% due to invalid submission of ICD-9 codes.
- Final end-to-end testing will occur between July 20 to July 24. Those who participated in the first two rounds of testing are automatically eligible to participate in the July testing.
Dive Insight:
ICD-10 implementation has been delayed several times despite pressure from industry groups like the American Health Information Management Association, which has said CMS estimates a year delay costs between $1 billion and $6.6 billion. The AMA has criticized the switch to ICD-10 and suggested end-to-end testing for the preparation of the new guidelines.
Industry wrangling over the adoption of the new codeset still hasn't slowed, although the switchover date is a mere four months away and the administration appears to be holding firm this time. Rep. Ted Poe introduced legislation last month to ban the use of ICD-10, saying: "The new ICD-10 codes will not make one patient healthier. What it will do is put an unnecessary strain on the medical community who should be focused on treating patients, not implementing a whole new bureaucratic language."
Want to read more? You might enjoy this GIF guide to the most important animal ICD-10 codes.