ICD-10

October 1, 2013 is the cut over day for practices to convert from the almost 30 year use of ICD-9 to ICD-10. While this conversion will obviously affect medical coders and billing staff, most of the marketplace is overlooking the impact this will have on the physician.

Physicians are used to spending 2-3 seconds after a patient encounter to circle the appropriate procedure and diagnosis codes to capture the charge. With Meaningful Use incentives, many practices are transitioning from paper superbills to EMR templates. This considerably slows down the physician and the stream of revenue in the business.

With the ICD-10 code set having 4.5 times the number of codes as ICD-9, the paper superbill presently used by over 70% of practices today will have to go through substantial facelifts to remain functional. The 8 ½ x 11” piece of paper could be made 4.5 times as large, have 1/4 the font size, or be on 4 ½ sheets of paper—all of which are impractical solutions. One recommendation White Plume would make is to transition to an electronic superbill now in order to gain experience with the electronic interaction. Electronic forms can be designed and laid out exactly like your old superbill, preserving the muscle memory of the physician user. White Plume has solutions such as AccelaCAPTURE, a paper superbill under glass, to bridge the EMR Gap between old paper superbills and EMRs.

For our current and prospective customers, White Plume is currently developing a solution that will make the transition on Monday, September 30, 2013 to Tuesday, October 1, 2013 a seamless one.

In a matter of a couple of clicks physicians should be able to get that information to the proper billing staff so they can be paid for services rendered.