ICD-10 to Get 5,500 New Codes, Including Ones for Face, Hand Transplants, CMS Says

By Susan Morse for Healthcare IT News

CMS said it plans to add about 1,900 diagnosis codes and 3,651 hospital inpatient procedure codes to the coding system.

On Oct. 1, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will add another 5,500 codes to the ICD-10 diagnostic library, officials announced in a March 9 meeting. The addition will come exactly one year after ICD-10, with its nearly 70,000 billable codes, replaced the dated, and much more compact, ICD-9 code set.

CMS said it plans to add about 1,900 diagnosis codes and 3,651 hospital inpatient procedure codes to the ICD-10 coding system for healthcare claims in fiscal year 2017.

Of the 3,651 new hospital inpatient procedure codes, 97 percent will update the cardiovascular and lower joint body systems, CMS said. There will also be new codes for a face transplant, hand transplant and donor organ perfusion, CMS said.

The large number of new codes is due to a partial freeze on updates prior to the original launch on October 1, 2015 according to CMS. The 2016 update will include the backlog of all proposals for changes to the code set.

The new and revised ICD-10-CM (Clinical Modification) and ICD-10 PCS (Procedure Coding System) codes will be included in the hospital inpatient prospective payment system proposed rule for fiscal 2017, which is expected next month. Diagnostic Related Group changes will also launch on Oct. 1, according to CMS.