OREANDA-NEWS.  November 28, 2013. RelayHealth Financial announced that all of its financial connectivity solutions meet the current ICD-10 standards one year ahead of the U.S. federal government deadline. The company also announced an ICD-10 testing program at no cost to its customers, so they can initiate testing with their payers.

"If ICD-10 were implemented today, we could process our customers' claims," said Joshua Berman, ICD-10 director for RelayHealth Financial. "Make no mistake about it: ICD-10 compliance is crucial to the financial health and success of hospitals and other healthcare providers. Those who aren't ready, risk serious financial and administrative burdens. That's why we've committed substantial resources to application readiness and testing strategies that, frankly, go far beyond any other vendor. We want customers to be ready for the coding changes that are coming."

ICD-10 is a comprehensive diagnostic and procedure coding system that replaces ICD-9, which was developed by the World Health Organization in the 1970s. ICD-10 expands available codes from about 14,000 to 68,000 for diagnoses, and from about 4,000 to roughly 87,000 for procedures. The code expansion is designed to sharpen specificity and accuracy in the assignment of diagnoses and procedures, foster better quality of care data reporting, and improve accuracy in billing and claims submissions. ICD-10 will be a HIPAA-mandated code set on October 1, 2014. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) stated there will be no delays and no grace period for compliance of ICD-10-CM (diagnoses) and ICD-10-PCS (procedures).

RelayHealth surveyed payers in March and September, and found the vast majority will test their systems with an extremely limited number of providers. RelayHealth Financial's testing program lets providers test their own processes and see how most of the payers they work with are faring. The testing program includes these strategic planks:

Self-supported payer testing that allows providers to independently send ICD-10 837 test files to their payers, and begin independently testing between themselves and the payers.

End-to-end payer testing that lets providers send electronic ICD-10 test claims to payers in McKesson RelayHealth Financial's testing program. Test claims will be processed through RelayHealth and sent to payers using the same familiar process providers use with ICD-9 claims.
A "Payer Readiness Dashboard" that shows the current testing status of over 300 payers, the range of testing each payer offers, the payer's test completion date, and the connectivity success of the payers, giving customers more visibility into payer testing and payer readiness status.

For hospitals, verifying that financial connectivity software solutions are compliant is just the start. In addition, coding staff must be trained in the ICD-10 methodology, which features a vast increase in the number and complexity of diagnosis codes. And physicians and other providers who document conditions must learn to code in a compliant way that bills fees properly.

"Ask your revenue cycle vendor if they're ready," Berman said. "Ask them if they have a robust testing process in place. Because you can't afford to wait. ICD-10 compliance is a high stakes deadline for healthcare. To help ensure prompt, accurate, and cost-efficient processing of claims, it's critical that providers test their systems now-right now-to be sure they can process ICD-10 codes without error."

RelayHealth Financial urges hospitals and other providers to test their systems via RelayHealth's comprehensive testing features. If payers are not accepting true end-to-end testing, RelayHealth also encourages their providers to use self-supported testing to call their payers and ask them to accept it.

Customers can take advantage of RelayHealth's ICD-10 testing program now. Non-customers who are concerned about the ICD-10 readiness of their software vendor and would like more information about RelayHealth Financial Solutions should contact RelayHealth at.1-800-752-4143.