Canadian Family Physician Preferences on Updating the Classification System for Health Conditions and Related Issues

Area of Science:

• Health Services Research
• Medical Informatics
• Primary Care Medicine

Background:

• Physician billing claims are crucial for health system planning and secondary data use.
• The current diagnosis coding system, International Classification of Diseases version 9 (ICD-9), was adopted in 1979.
• Modernizing physician billing requirements is essential for accurate workload and patient complexity reflection.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate Canadian family physicians' perspectives on updating the ICD-9 coding system.
• To compare physician preferences between the current ICD-9 and newer systems: ICD-11 and ICPC-3.
• To gather data informing provinces/territories on modernizing physician billing.

Main Methods:

• An online survey and patient vignette coding exercise were administered to Canadian family physicians.
• Data were collected from 161 family physicians across six provinces.
• Survey data were analyzed descriptively to capture preferences on coding systems.

Main Results:

• 58% of participating physicians believe the ICD-9 system should be replaced.
• 86% of physicians felt confident in their ability to learn a new coding system.
• High satisfaction rates were reported for both ICD-11 (77%) and ICPC-3 (73%) after the coding exercise.

Conclusions:

• Family physicians support transitioning from the outdated ICD-9 system.
• Newer coding systems (ICD-11, ICPC-3) are perceived favorably by physicians.
• Recommendations are provided for modernizing physician billing requirements in Canadian provinces/territories.