WHO ripping off medical providers for coding book fees
The World Health Organization owns the copyright to the ICD-10 codes that are currently used around the world to apply for reimbursement through the various insurance companies. They slowly update the books and change codes in order to force medical providers to purchase newer books when only a handful of codes have changed. But if you don’t use the “right” code, the insurance company will deny your payment. If these codes are supposed to be more accurate and needed for increased research, why aren’t there more specific codes for the typical issues seen in medical practice? The have codes for left side (1) and right side (2) of almost every single body joint or problem, but quite often patients have issues on BOTH sides. Why not create a code for bilateral (3) problems to avoid have to use two codes for one problem? Even better, why not have a code for “left worse than right” (4) or “right worse than left” (5)? They will probably get around to this but doing it slowly makes them more money!