Development of the ICD-10 simplified version and field test

Background: The International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th Revision (ICD-10) has been used in various Asia-Pacific countries for more than 20 years. Although ICD-10 is a powerful tool, clinical coding processes are complex; therefore, many developing countries have not been able to implement ICD-10-based health statistics (WHO-FIC APN, 2007).

Objective: This study aimed to simplify ICD-10 clinical coding processes, to modify index terms to facilitate computer searching and to provide a simplified version of ICD-10 for use in developing countries.

Method: The World Health Organization Family of International Classifications Asia-Pacific Network (APN) developed a simplified version of the ICD-10 and conducted field testing in Cambodia during February and March 2016. Ten hospitals were selected to participate. Each hospital sent a team to join a training workshop before using the ICD-10 simplified version to code 100 cases. All hospitals subsequently sent their coded records to the researchers.

Results: Overall, there were 1038 coded records with a total of 1099 ICD clinical codes assigned. The average accuracy rate was calculated as 80.71% (66.67-93.41%). Three types of clinical coding errors were found. These related to errors relating to the coder (14.56%), those resulting from the physician documentation (1.27%) and those considered system errors (3.46%).

Discussion: The field trial results demonstrated that the APN ICD-10 simplified version is feasible for implementation as an effective tool to implement ICD-10 clinical coding for hospitals.

Conclusion: Developing countries may consider adopting the APN ICD-10 simplified version for ICD-10 code assignment in hospitals and health care centres. The simplified version can be viewed as an introductory tool which leads to the implementation of the full ICD-10 and may support subsequent ICD-11 adoption.