The Coalition for ICD-10, a group of 14 prominent industry stakeholders and organizations, has written a letter to CMS Administrator Marilyn Tavenner, pressing CMS to set a new ICD-10 transition date quickly to ease the effects of the delay.
Signed into law earlier this month, the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014, in addition to shielding physicians from a 24 percent reimbursement cut under Medicare's sustainable growth formula and delaying the implementation of the two-midnight rule, also delays the nation's switch to ICD-10 coding by at least a year.
CMS has been mostly silent on the delay, and has yet to confirm if the new ICD-10 deadline will be Oct. 1, 2015, the earliest it could be under the Act. A short notice on the CMS website posted earlier this week said official guidance was forthcoming.
In the letter to Ms. Tavenner, the members of the Coalition for ICD-10 implore CMS to select and announce the new transition date of Oct. 1, 2015, as soon as possible to stem the disruptions and financial losses the delay has caused stakeholders.
"A 30 percent cost increase due to a one-year delay is consistent with the experience and observations of the coalition members," according to the letter. "Continued uncertainty relative to the ICD-10 implementation date will add significant demands on limited resources and will measurably increase the overall cost of completing the transition."
Coalition members include the Advanced Medical Technology Association, the American Health Information Management Association, the American Hospital Association, America's Health Insurance Plans, the American Medical Informatics Association, BlueCross BlueShield Association, the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives, Healthcare Billing & Management Association, the Health IT Now Coalition, the Medical Device Manufacturers Association, 3M Health Information Systems, Roche Diagnostics Corporation, Siemens Health Services and WellPoint.
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