The Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) has submitted a letter to Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Acting Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Administrator Marilyn Tavenner to reiterate strong support for maintaining the October 1, 2014 revised date for nationwide adoption of ICD-10.

In its Feb. 7 letter, HIMSS urged CMS to “send a strong message that ICD-10 has already been thoroughly vetted, will be implemented on the regulatory date, and that we must move forward with the nationwide implementation of ICD-10 by the current adoption date of October 1, 2014 in order to realize the significant advantages of healthcare transformation." Advantages cited in the letter include: 

• Enhanced patient experience
• Emphasis on health IT as the groundwork for overall healthcare transformation
• Quality of population health and healthcare delivery improvement
• Eliminating waste by improving clinical and business intelligence
• Cost savings in avoiding loss of billions of dollars in already-invested efforts in preparing for ICD-10.

HIMSS outlines its considerable education efforts to support providers and provider organizations with ICD-10 transition, including its ICD-10 Playbook and the HIMSS/Workgroup for Electronic Data Interchange (WEDI) ICD-10 National Pilot Program currently in development. HIMSS also notes that the “improvement and standardization of electronic transactions has already proven to be a beneficial cost savings to the industry and must continue progress in this area or we stand to lose these savings.”

HIMSS strongly encourages CMS to avoid any further delays in the ICD-10 adoption date, and noted that any further delays in ICD-10 will only signal that CMS is not serious about administrative simplification and HIPAA requirements.