Latest News Congress Delays ICD-10 Implementation One Year By Staff Friday, April 4, 2014 12:27 AM WASHINGTON, D.C.—The implementation of ICD-10 was delayed for at least one year, and a Medicare payment reduction was replaced with an increase, when President Obama signed the Protecting Access to Medicare Act on April 1, 2014. As many optometrists and ophthalmologists were aware of and were preparing for, ICD-10 (the International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision) list of medical classification codes was scheduled for implementation on Oct. 1, 2014, but the new law has delayed that for at least one year. It is the third delay of the date for ICD-10 compliance. However, while the new legislation does mention the date Oct. 1, 2015, it does not specify that it will be implemented specifically on that date. Instead, it states that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) “may not, prior to Oct. 1, 2015, adopt ICD-10 code sets.” ICD-10 will not be implemented prior to that date, but when it will be finally implemented has yet to be determined. In addition, the new law also replaces a 24 percent reduction to Medicare physicians that had been scheduled to take place on April 1, 2014, with a 0.5 percent increase through March 31, 2015.