Partial Code Freeze Prior to ICD-10 Implementation

At the ICD-9-CM Coordination & Maintenance Committee Meeting (September 15, 2010), it was announced that the committee had finalized the decision to implement a partial freeze for both ICD-9-CM codes and ICD-10-CM and ICD-10-PCS codes prior to implementation of ICD-10 on October 1, 2013. There was considerable support for this partial freeze.


The partial freeze will be implemented as follows:

• The last regular annual update to both ICD-9 and ICD-10 code sets will be made on October 1, 2011.
• On October 1, 2012 there will be only limited code updates to both ICD-9- CM and ICD- 10 code sets to capture new technology and new diseases.
• There will be no updates to ICD-9 -CM on October 1, 2013 as the system will no longer be a HIPAA standard.

On October 1, 2014 regular updates to ICD-10 will begin. The ICD-9 Coordination & Maintenance Committee will continue to meet twice a year during the freeze. At these meetings the public will be allowed to comment on whether or not requests for new diagnosis and procedure codes should be created based on the need to capture new technology or disease. Any code requests that do not meet the criteria will be evaluated for implementation within ICD-10 on or after October 1, 2014, once the partial freeze is ended.

To view the transcript of the meeting, go to: http://www.cms.gov/ICD9ProviderDiagnosticCodes/03_meetings.asp. From there, select the September 15-16, 2010 meeting transcript in the download section, and then from the ZIP files, select the 091510_Morning_Transcript file. This section appears on page 4 of the 78-page proceeding.