CSN Discuss Bulletin

International Classification of Diseases (ICD)-10

April 2004

This bulletin comes to you from the Children's Safety Network through the CSNDISCUSS list, an electronic forum for the discussion of child and adolescent injury and violence prevention and related issues.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction
A Question from CSN
Articles and Reports
  1. Website
    National Center for Health Statistics website.
  2. Report
    Comparability of cause of death between ICD-9 and ICD-10: Preliminary estimates.
  3. Article
    The effect of the introduction of ICD-10 on trends in mortality from injury and poisoning in England and Wales.
  4. Article
    Reporting of the incidence of hospitalized injuries: numerator issues.
  5. Report
    Deaths: Preliminary data for 1999.
Related Resources from CSN
  1. Fact Sheet
    The HIPAA Privacy Rule.

AVAILABILITY

Copies of many items can be delivered to state Maternal and Child Health and state public health staff upon request. Availability (online, hard copy or e-mail) of articles is noted at the end of each annotation. To request an article or other publication, e-mail jhudson@edc.org with the item name, delivery preference (e-mail, fax number, or mailing address). This service is restricted to state Maternal and Child Health and state public health staff. Restricted time and resources forbids us from delivering articles to others.

URLs of publications that can be downloaded from the web are included in the bibliographic information.

Introduction

The International Classification of Diseases (ICD) was designed to promote international comparability in the collection, processing, classification, and presentation of mortality statistics. Prior to 1999, injury related fatalities were coded using the International Classification of Diseases 9 th Revision (ICD-9) external cause of injury codes – commonly referred to as E codes. In 1999, the 10 th revision of the ICD (ICD-10) was implemented for coding deaths. In ICD-19, E codes were replaced with V, W, X, and Y codes.

Information on the cause of injuries is essential for designing effective injury prevention programs. In most cases, ICD-10 will provide much more detail about injuries, such as the place in which the injury happened and the activity in which the person was involved when he or she was injured.

The two classification schemes are different enough as to make direct comparisons of cause of death difficult. Changes in trend numbers from 1998 to 1999 could be a result of the change in code definitions and coding rules, rather than changes in the injuries themselves. Maternal and Child Health agencies using mortality data to track their core and state performance measures should be aware of these changes while monitoring their progress.

A Question from CSN

The Children's Safety Network would like to share your state's experience with the transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10.

Specifically:

Responses will be summarized and posted to CSN Discuss. Please respond to Nilam Patel at npatel@projects.sdsu.edu

Articles and Reports
  1. National Center for Health Statistics website (www.cdc.gov/nchs/)

    The National Center for Health Statistics website includes a resources pertinent to the transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10. These include the following:
  2. Anderson, R., Minino, A., Hoyert, D., and Rosenberg, H.
    Comparability of cause of death between ICD-9 and ICD-10: Preliminary estimates. National Vital Statistics Reports. 2001 May 18; 49(2): 1-32.

    This report provides preliminary results from a study describing the effects of implementing ICD-10 for selected causes of death occurring in the U.S. in 1999.

    Available online at: www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr49/nvsr49_02.pdf
  3. Griffiths C., and Rooney C.
    The effect of the introduction of ICD-10 on trends in mortality from injury and poisoning in England and Wales. Health Statistics Quarterly. 2003 Autumn; Whole 18.

    This article examines the effect of the introduction of ICD-10 on the reporting of mortality from injury and poisoning in England and Wales.

    Available online at www.statistics.gov.uk/about/classifications/ICD10/
  4. Boufous S., and Williamson A.
    Reporting of the incidence of hospitalized injuries: Numerator issues.
    Injury Prevention . 2003 December; 9(4): 370-5.

    The authors of this article examined data from the 1999-2000 New South Wales ( Australia ) Inpatient Statistics Collection to determine the frequency of medical injuries and injuries occurring at the hospital. Approximately 27.5 percent of the discharge records with non-injury primary diagnoses included a nature of injury code in subsequent diagnostic fields. Fifty-three percent of discharge records for medical injuries included a nature of injury code. The authors concluded that selecting cases by primary diagnosis alone would underestimate the injuries occurring in the hospital.

    Available: hard copy or e-mail
  5. Kochanek, K., Smith, B., and Anderson, R.
    Deaths: Preliminary data for 1999.
    National Vital Statistics Reports. 2001 June 26; 49(3).

    This report contains data from the first year the 10th revision of the ICD was introduced. The report showed declines for several leading causes of death including heart disease, cancer, suicide, homicide, and firearm mortality. According to the report, suicide dropped from 8th to 11th among leading causes of death in 1999.

    Available online at www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr49/nvsr49_03.pdf
Related Resources from CSN
  1. Children's Safety Network Economics & Data Analysis Resource Center (2003).
    The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA): The Privacy rule. Calverton, MD: Author.

    This fact sheet summarizes information on the implications of HIPAA to epidemiologists and other researchers. Available online at www.edarc.org/pubs/facts/hipaa030808.pdf
Please direct questions about this bulletin to Nilam Patel at 602-896-4313 or npatel@projects.sdsu.edu

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