On Friday, June 13 (coincidence, omen, or both), the Office of Management & Budget (OMB) received the interim rule to implement the ICD-10 diagnosis and procedure code set by October 1, 2015. Interim rules typically have a public comment and review period of 90 days, at which time, the OMB may publsh as originally drafted or modify based on those public comments. Following that time line, it is possible that a final rule for ICD-10 implementation may be published in the Federal Register around the end of September. Assuming the date does not change, that would give NYP and the rest of the healthcare industry one more year to ready itself for the new code set.
As we know, and have experienced, such rules are not written in stone and can be overturned by congressional actions similar to the fourth (yes… fourth) and most recent delay handed down in April of this year through its inclusion in the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014. In the interim, the industry, most notably the Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange (WEDI) continues to pressure the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Department of Health & Human Services for more information, more education, and a stronger, more concrete testing and readiness plan to get the larger industry to embrace the transition.