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Significance of ICD-10 Transition and Guide for Implementation
A monumental change is marked by ICD-10 code transition across the global healthcare industry. With a massive set of codes, very huge volume of codes is found to have come into effect, making a great positive difference to the healthcare environment in the modern world. The way medical coding is performed has been transformed with ICD-10. Small and medium sized medical practices across the globe need to follow the implementation guide for getting ready to face the changes efficiently.
ICD-10 Implementation - the Financial Part
Small and medium clinics and physician practices may find implementation cost of ICD-10 excessive. Involving around USD 200,000 for small practices and USD 800,000 for medium practices, the costs are really noteworthy. This calls for diligently following the implementation guide.
Phases and Timeline of Implementation
It is essential to develop an effective implementation strategy first, that covers an evaluation of the impact on your specific practice, a budget, and a detailed timeline. Practices need to prudently check with their practice management software vendors, clearinghouse, and billing service providers about their respective compliance plans. Practices that internally handle their software development and billing processes have to plan for their coding/medical records, IT, finance, and clinical staff for coordinating the ICD-10 transition process-related efforts.
The process of ICD-10 implementation related to small and medium sized medical practices categorize the tasks and milestones into the six major phases given below:
Establishment of project management structure
Enabling leadership to understand the significance and breadth of ICD-10 transition
Assignment of decision-making and overall responsibilities to manage the transition to a committee or a person
Comprehensive budget planning that includes costs related to training and software upgrades
Adherence to pre-defined timeline that suits your particular practice
Governance plan establishment that facilitates communication with all external partners
Ensuring that all stakeholders, internal and external are committed - physicians, vendors, clearinghouses, affiliated medical facilities, and others need to be contacted for determining their plans regarding the transition
Based on your specific practice processes, policies, and systems, additional tasks must be identified
Critical predecessors and dependencies must be identified
Task owners and resources need to be identified
Start and end dates must be estimated
Entry and exit criteria between phases need to be identified
Plan must be updated throughout the implementation of ICD-10 and even afterwards
A process for risk management must be in place
Department-wise or external/internal functions-wise risks must be identified
The chances of a risk occurring need to be identified, along with its potential impacts as well as appropriate ways of avoiding risks. Ways include alternate vendor identification, providing training, and building up increased lines of credit or cash reserves
Risk reduction action responsibility must be assigned - this includes when management must be involved via appropriate channels according to your practice structure
Communication plan creation
Enabling external and internal stakeholders to understand their specific responsibilities towards ICD-10 implementation - the plan has to identify the following:
Providers who use ICD-10 codes can better understand their patient populations and the different conditions that affect them. Better information leads to better and informed decisions! 75Health ICD-10 helps practices and medical service providers to chart immediately with ICD-10 codes with the least efforts!