ICD-10-CM Coding, COVID 19, and the Pursuit of Health Equity

According to the World Health Organization, Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) are the economic and social conditions in which people are born, live, grow, work, and age. These can include poverty, education, marital status, social status, living arrangements, and geographic location.

The prevalence of health inequities in the United States is a significant public health issue that has come to the forefront of healthcare with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the many examples of this phenomenon is the risk of developing a health-related condition exponentially increases with the prevalence of poverty.

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, eight million people in the United States have slipped into poverty. It is critical to capture SDoH data in order to improve outcomes for both individual patients and entire populations. Although many of these situations are documented within the medical record, they are not always coded. ICD-10-CM codes within Chapter 21 identify numerous SDoH situations. Addressing these factors with the help of accurately coded data can influence hospital readmission rates, risk of morbidity/mortality, reduce costs, and more.

Watch this webinar and learn how to:

• Recognize how SDoH can influence a person’s health
• Identify documentation needed to code SDoH
• Apply accurate ICD-10-CM coding to capture SDoH