International variation in the definition of 'main condition' in ICD-coded health data.
- Quan H Department of Community Health Sciences, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada.
- Moskal L Canadian Institute for Health Information, Ottawa, Canada.
- Forster AJ Ottawa Hospital Research Institute and Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, Ottawa, Canada.
- Brien S Health Council of Canada, Toronto, Canada.
- Walker R Department of Community Health Sciences, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada.
- Romano PS Departments of Internal Medicine and Pediatrics, and Center for Healthcare Policy and Research, University of California Davis, Davis, USA.
- Sundararajan V Department of Medicine, St. Vincent's Hospital, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia Department of Medicine, Southern Clinical School, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia.
- Burnand B Institut Universitaire de Médecine Sociale et Préventive, Centre, Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois and University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.
- Henriksson G Nordic WHO FIC Collaborating Centre, Oslo, Norway.
- Steinum O Nordic WHO FIC Collaborating Centre, Oslo, Norway.
- Droesler S Faculty of Industrial Engineering and Health Care, Niederrhein University of Applied Sciences, Reinarzstrasse 49, Krefeld, Germany.
- Pincus HA Department of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, Division of Clinical Phenomenology, New York, NY, USA.
- Ghali WA Department of Community Health Sciences, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada Department of Medicine, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada.
- 2014-07-04
Published in:
- International journal for quality in health care : journal of the International Society for Quality in Health Care. - 2014
benchmarking
international classification of disease
measurement of quality
standards
Clinical Coding
Hospital Administration
Humans
International Classification of Diseases
Internationality
Reproducibility of Results
English
Hospital-based medical records are abstracted to create International Classification of Disease (ICD) coded discharge health data in many countries. The 'main condition' is not defined in a consistent manner internationally. Some countries employ a 'reason for admission' rule as the basis for the main condition, while other countries employ a 'resource use' rule. A few countries have recently transitioned from one of these approaches to the other. The definition of 'main condition' in such ICD data matters when it is used to define a disease cohort to assign diagnosis-related groups and to perform risk adjustment. We propose a method of harmonizing the international definition to enable researchers and international organizations using ICD-coded health data to aggregate or compare hospital care and outcomes across countries in a consistent manner. Inter-observer reliability of alternative harmonization approaches should be evaluated before finalizing the definition and adopting it worldwide.
- Language
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- English
- Open access status
- green
- Identifiers
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- DOI 10.1093/intqhc/mzu064
- PMID 24990594
- Persistent URL
- https://sonar.ch/global/documents/259262
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