[Federal Register Volume 62, Number 65 (Friday, April 4, 1997)]
[Notices]
[Pages 16161-16162]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 97-8597]


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DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics; Meetings

    Pursuant to the Federal Advisory Committee Act, the Department of 
Health and Human Services announces the following advisory committee 
meetings.

    Name: National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics (NCVHS), 
Subcommittee on Health Data Needs, Standards, and Security.
    Times and Dates: 9:30 a.m.-6 p.m., April 15, 1997; 9 a.m.-5:30 
p.m., April 16, 1997.
    Place: Room 503A, Hubert H. Humphrey Building, 200 Independence 
Avenue, SW, Washington, DC 20201.
    Status: Open.
    Purpose: Under the Administrative Simplification provisions of 
Pub. L. 104-191, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability 
Act of 1996 (HIPAA), the Secretary of Health and Human Services is 
required to adopt standards for specified transactions to enable 
health information to be exchanged electronically. The law requires 
that, within 24 months of adoption, all health plans, health care 
clearinghouses, and health care providers who choose to conduct 
these transactions electronically must comply with these standards. 
The law also requires the Secretary to adopt a number of supporting 
standards including standards for code sets and classifications 
systems. The Secretary is required to consult with the National 
Committee on Vital and Health Statistics (NCVHS) in complying with 
these provisions. The NCVHS is the Department's federal advisory 
committee on health data, privacy and health information policy.
    To assist in the development of the NCVHS recommendations to 
HHS, the NCVHS Subcommittee on Health Data Needs, Standards, and 
Security has been holding a series of public meetings to obtain the 
views, perspectives and concerns of interested and affected parties. 
On the morning of April 15, the Subcommittee's Working Group on Data 
Standards and Security will hold a public meeting at which they will 
be briefed by HHS on the status of and plans for unique identifiers 
for providers and payers.
    On the afternoon of April 15th and all day on April 16th, the 
full Subcommittee will consider and discuss perspectives on medical 
and clinical coding and classification issues in the implementation 
of Pub. L. 104-191. For the meeting, the Subcommittee is inviting 
specific organizations representing both the users and developers of 
medical and clinical classification systems to address the following 
questions in writing, to make brief oral presentations of their 
answers, and to answer further questions from the Subcommittee. 
Other organizations that would also like to submit written 
statements on these issues are invited to do so.
    Questions to be Addressed:
    1. What medical/clinical codes and classifications do you use in 
administrative transactions now? What do you perceive as the main 
strengths and weaknesses of current methods for coding and 
classification of encounter and/or enrollment data?
    2. What medical/clinical codes and classifications do you 
recommend as initial standards for administrative transactions, 
given the time frames in the HIPAA? What specific suggestions would 
you like to see implemented regarding coding and classification?
    3. Prior to the passage of HIPAA, the National Center for Health 
Statistics initiated development of a clinical modification of ICD-
10 (ICD-10-CM) and the Health Care Financing Administration 
undertook development of a new procedure coding system for inpatient 
procedures (called ICD-10-PCS), with a plan to implement them 
simultaneously in the year 2000. On the pre-HIPAA schedule, they 
will be released to the field for evaluation and testing by 1998. If 
some version of ICD is to be used for administrative transactions, 
do you think it should be ICD-9-CM or ICD-10-CM and ICD-10-PCS, 
assuming that field evaluations are generally positive?
    4. Recognizing that the goal of Pub. L. 104-191 is 
administrative simplification, how, from your perspective, would you 
deal with the current coding environment to improve simplification 
and reduce administrative burden, but also obtain medically 
meaningful information?
    5. How should the ongoing maintenance of medical/clinical code 
sets and the responsibility, intellectual input and funding for 
maintenance be addressed for the classification systems included in 
the standards? What are the arguments for having these systems in 
the public domain versus in the private sector, with or without 
copyright?
    6. What would the resource implications be of changing from the 
coding and classification systems that you currently are using in 
administrative transactions to other systems?
    7. A Coding and Classification Implementation Team has been 
established within the Department of Health and Human Services to 
address the requirements of Pub. L. 104-191. Does your organization 
have any concerns about the process being undertaken by the 
Department to carry out the requirements of the law in regard to 
coding and classification issues? If so, what are those concerns and 
what suggestions do you have for improvements?
    Notice: In the interest of security, the Department has 
instituted stringent procedures for entrance to the Hubert H. 
Humphrey building by non-government employees. Thus, persons without 
a government identification card will need to have the guard call 
for an escort to the meeting.
    Contact Person for More Information: Substantive program 
information as well as summaries of the meeting and a roster of 
committee members may be obtained from James Scanlon, NCVHS 
Executive Staff

[[Page 16162]]

Director, Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and 
Evaluation, DHHS, Room 440-D, Humphrey Building, 200 Independence 
Avenue SW., Washington, DC 20201, telephone (202) 690-7100, or 
Marjorie S. Greenberg, Acting Executive Secretary, NCVHS, NCHS, CDC, 
Room 1100, Presidential Building, 6525 Belcrest Road, Hyattsville, 
Maryland 20782, telephone (301) 436-7050. Information also is 
available on the NCVHS home page of the HHS website: http://
aspe.os.dhhs.gov/ncvhs.

    Dated: March 26, 1997.
James Scanlon,
Director, Division of Data Policy, Office of the Assistant Secretary 
for Planning and Evaluation.
[FR Doc. 97-8597 Filed 4-3-97; 8:45 am]
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