Transition to ICD-10 code sets delayed

On April 1, 2014, President Obama signed into law the "Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014," which directs the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services to postpone post-payment audits of the two-midnight rule until after March 31, 2015.

The act also delays the transition from ICD-9 to ICD-10 code sets. The legislation states: "The Secretary of Health and Human Services may not, prior to October 1, 2015, adopt ICD-10 code sets as the standard for code sets under section 1173(c) of the Social Security Act (42 U.S.C. 1320d-2(c)) and section 162.1002 of title 45, Code of Federal Regulations."

The primary purpose of the law, commonly referred to as the latest "doc fix," was to avoid a cut in physician Medicare reimbursement that had been scheduled to take effect April 1.

The full text of the law can be found here: http://beta.congress.gov/113/bills/hr4302/BILLS-113hr4302enr.pdf.