On May 26, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) outlined additional unspecified diagnosis codes the agency is excluding from both ICD-9 and ICD-10 reporting beginning January 2, 2017.
The technical alert states the codes, “will not be accepted in the in the Alleged Cause of Injury, Incident or Illness (Field 15) or in any ICD Diagnosis Code field starting with Field 18. Updates to previously submitted records using these excluded codes, will also be rejected.”
These additions and upcoming changes to the ICD-10 codeset underline the need for clinical documentation improvement and ICD-10 training, experts say, as code and rule freezes are lifted by the healthcare payment agency. ICD-10-CM will include 1900 new codes and several more changes and deletions. Attention to documentation quality will be paramount.
Impacts Workers’ Comp and Auto
CMS writes that this change supersedes the applicable language in the MMSEA Section 111 Medicare Secondary Payer Mandatory Reporting Liability Insurance (Including Self-Insurance), No Fault Insurance, and Workers’ Compensation User Guide (Version 4.9).
The following ICD-9-CM will be added to the list of excluded diagnosis codes:
- 999.9 (Other and unspecified complications of medical care, not elsewhere classified)
The following ICD-10-CM will be added to the list of excluded diagnosis codes:
- T88.7XXA (Unspecified adverse effect of drug or medicament, initial encounter)
- T88.7XXD (Unspecified adverse effect of drug or medicament, subsequent encounter)
- T88.7XXS (Unspecified adverse effect of drug or medicament, sequela)
- T88.8XXA (Other specified complications of surgical and medical care, not elsewhere classified, initial encounter)
- T88.8XXD (Other specified complications of surgical and medical care, not elsewhere classified, subsequent encounter)
- T88.8XXS (Other specified complications of surgical and medical care, not elsewhere classified, sequela)
- T88.9XXA (Complication of surgical and medical care, unspecified, initial encounter) ·
- T88.9XXD (Complication of surgical and medical care, unspecified, subsequent encounter)
- T88.9XXS (Complication of surgical and medical care, unspecified, sequela)
Read the Technical Alert here: https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Coordination-of-Benefits-and-Recovery/Mandatory-Insurer-Reporting-For-Non-Group-Health-Plans/Downloads/New-Downloads/Technical-Alert-New-Excluded-Diagnosis-Codes.pdf
