ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee

Recognizing the ICD-9-CM as a dynamic statistical tool that must be flexible to meet expanding classification needs, the ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee was created as a forum for proposals to update ICD-9-CM. A representative from the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) and one from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) co-chair the ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee meetings. Responsibility for maintenance of the ICD-9-CM is divided between the two agencies, with classification of diagnoses (volumes 1 and 2) by NCHS and of procedures (volume 3) by CMS.

Although the ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee is a Federal Committee, suggestions for modifications come from both the public and private sectors. Interested parties must submit proposals for modification prior to a scheduled meeting.

Submission of Proposals

NOTE: Beginning with the September 2011 ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee meeting only proposals for new codes/revisions for a new disease/new technology procedure will be accepted for ICD-9-CM. All other proposals must be submitted as changes to ICD-10-CM/PCS. Please see information about the partial freeze of these two classifications at the bottom of this page.

Proposals for a new code should include:

• Description of the code(s)/change(s) being requested
• Rationale for why the new code/change is needed (including clinical relevancy)
• Supporting clinical references and literature should also be submitted.

Proposals should be consistent with the structure and conventions of the classification.

For proposal samples, see proposal documents from previous meetings in Summary and Proposals .

For proposal submission, please send to the following email address: nchsicd10CM@cdc.gov and for deadline, see Upcoming Meeting .

Once proposals are reviewed all requestors will be contacted as to whether the proposal has been approved for presentation at the Coordination and Maintenance Committee meeting or not.

Public Meetings

• The ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee meetings are open to the public and held at CMS headquarters in Baltimore, MD.
• Registration is required by CMS using their meeting registration website. Registration opens approximately one month prior to the meeting.
• Approved proposals are presented and comments are encouraged both at the meetings and in writing. No decisions are made at the meetings. Recommendations and comments are carefully reviewed and evaluated, once the comment period has closed, before final decisions are made.
• The ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee’s role is advisory. All final decisions are made by the Director of NCHS and the Administrator of CMS. Final decisions are made at the end of the year and become effective October 1 of the following year.
• Official code revision packages, which are referred to as addenda, are available from this website. Procedure addenda is available from the CMS website.

Meeting Materials

• The tentative agenda for the upcoming meeting will be posted here approximately one month prior to the meeting.
• Electronic copies of meeting materials (proposals and other handouts) are posted on this website just prior to the meeting to allow participants to download them. No paper copies of these materials are available at the meeting.
• The summary is posted shortly following the meeting.
• The summary for the most recent meeting includes the deadline for written comments, scheduled dates for the next meeting, deadline for receipt of modification proposals, and mailing/e-mail addresses to send either modification proposals or comments on proposals.

Partial Freeze of Revisions to ICD-9-CM and ICD-10-CM/PCS

The ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee implemented a partial freeze of the ICD-9-CM and ICD-10 (ICD-10-CM and ICD-10-PCS) codes prior to the implementation of ICD-10. The partial freeze is scheduled to end one year after the implementation of ICD-10. There was considerable support for this partial freeze. On April 1, 2014, the Protecting Access to Medicare Act of 2014 (PAMA) (Pub. L. No. 113-93) was enacted, which said that the Secretary may not adopt ICD-10 prior to October 1, 2015. Accordingly, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services issued a final rule on August 4, 2014 that changed the compliance date for ICD-10 from October 1, 2014 to October 1, 2015. The final rule also requires HIPAA covered entities to continue to use ICD-9-CM through September 30, 2015. Links to the final rule are provided at http://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Coding/ICD10/Statute_Regulations.html.

The partial freeze will be implemented as follows:

• The last regular, annual updates to both ICD-9-CM and ICD-10 code sets were made on October 1, 2011.
• On October 1, 2012, October 1, 2013, and October 1, 2014 there were only limited code updates to both the ICD-9-CM and ICD-10 code sets to capture new technologies and diseases as required by section 503(a) of Pub. L. 108-173.
• On October 1, 2015, there will be only limited code updates to ICD-10 code sets to capture new technologies and diagnoses as required by section 503(a) of Pub. L. 108-173. There will be no updates to ICD-9-CM, as it will no longer be used for reporting.
• On October 1, 2016 (one year after implementation of ICD-10), regular updates to ICD-10 will begin.

The ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee will continue to meet twice a year during the partial freeze. At these meetings, the public will be asked to comment on whether or not requests for new diagnosis or procedure codes should be created based on the criteria of the need to capture a new technology or disease. Any code requests that do not meet the criteria will be evaluated for implementation within ICD-10 on and after October 1, 2016 once the partial freeze has ended.

Upcoming Meetings

March 9-10, 2016
Proposals are due by January 15, 2016

September 13-14, 2016
Proposals are due by July 15, 2016