A community of 30,000 US Transcriptionist serving Medical Transcription Industry

Mandatory Certification? - kitty

Posted: Jan 14, 2012

I was told by someone who attended a recent ICD-10 academy (for trainers) that the OIG is requiring all (current) coders to be certified by the October, 2013, ICD-10 implementation date. I am aware of the OIG's compliance guidelines, but nowhere in that document do I find anything about mandatory certification.

Also, I am not sure if they meant certified in ICD-9 or 10, but it is my understanding that the last ICD-9 CCS/CCS-P exam will be given in March, 2013, and at this point nobody knows when the first ICD-10 CCS or CCS-P exam will be given. Is it even possible for a coder to be certified in ICD-10 before it's implementation?

Can anybody clarify this?

I think maybe . . . - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
I have not seen that about OIG. This would have been big news in my organization, so I wonder if she heard this about AHIMA. They are going to require their registered and certified folks to complete specified amounts of training by that date.

I have already completed it since I am an approved trainer, so I guess you can say there are people already "certified", so to speak. (It is not actually a certification.) There is no certification exam in it other than what is involved in the trainer program and will not be, it seems, until the new CCS and CCS-P. I will look through my email to see if I missed anything.

News, indeed...sm - kitty

[ In Reply To ..]
If the gov't was mandating that everyone in the coding field be certified/credentialed with a drop-dead date of October, 2013, that would be huge news, yes.

I am completely familiar with AHIMAs ICD-10 CEU requirements for those already credentialed in ICD-9, but nowhere on their web site do I see anything at all about the existence of an ICD-10 CCS exam, and certainly nothing about the OIG or anybody else mandating anything.

Thanks for responding, and if you come across anything about the OIG, please let me know. I will continue to follow this post.

Kitty - sm

[ In Reply To ..]
From the tone of your last post, it appears that my answer may have irritated you. From your question, it was not clear to me that you were "completely familiar" with AHIMA's CEU requirements. I tried to cover all the bases for you and for the others here who would not have understood what you were asking. I tried to give enough informmation to answer the question they were sure to ask. If you felt insulted by that I am very sorry.

Hopefully, someone here will have the information you wanted.

sm - kitty

[ In Reply To ..]
Your response didn't irritate or insult me at all. If I came across as either, it certainly wasn't from anything you said and I truly appreciate your input.

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