Local Chapter Update: Dates set, meetings fill up for Nov. and Dec.

We recently received a lovely email from our Michigan ACDIS Chapter leaders which included snapshots of the CDI/coding team from Munson Healthcare in Cadillac. The group dressed up like accidents and their corresponding ICD-10 codes recently in honor of Halloween—costumes included contact with hot drinks, struck by a horse, and bitten by a turtle, among other items.

"We did have fun with the [costumes] and received wonderful comments from our physicians, the physician liaison and our hospital president/CEO, and many other employees. We also had many opportunities to explain a little of ICD-10 to others in the hospital who were amazed with the complexity," says Lori Lierman, CCS, LPN, CDI specialist.

If your CDI team is doing some fun outreach or celebrating achievements, birthday, holidays, or other event consider sharing your photos with your chapter leadership and with ACDIS national. We’ll post them to our social media pages. If you’re attending one of the following local chapter events, don’t forget your cameras!

The following groups are holding meetings this November and December. For additional information regarding chapter events, visit www.acdis.org. To register for a local chapter in your state, fill out this online electronic membership roster.

Pennsylvania
The next ACDIS of Central PA meeting takes place Friday, November 20, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., at Reading Health System. Speakers are currently being sought for this program. To volunteer to speak, or to RSVP, email Lori.lafaver@readinghealth.org or dwilk@gshleb.org. 

Florida
The Florida ACDIS Chapter meets Friday, November 20, 12-1:30 p.m., via webinar with guest presentation by ACDIS Associate Director Melissa Varnavas regarding ICD-10-CM/PCS implementation news, and recent industry developments and guidelines. For information, contact Joannie Crotts, atjoannie-crotts@smh.com.

Virginia
The Virginia ACDIS Chapter meets Saturday, November 21, via webinar. For information, contact Autumn Reiter areiterrn@embarqmail.com.

Massachusetts
The Massachusetts ACDIS Chapter meets Wednesday, December 2, 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., at Brigham and Women’s Hospital Center for Nursing Excellence, in Boston. Agenda includes:

• ICD-10 Early Lessons, by Gina Mannion, director of coding at North Shore Medical Center
• Lunch, networking, chapter business/announcements
• Group discussion on ICD-10 topics
• ICD-10 Challenges, by Kelley Sears CDI specialist at Brigham and Women's Faulkner Hospital

For information, RSVP by Monday, November 16, to Cindy Labins by email at CMLabins@partners.org.

South CarolinaThe SC ACDIS Chapter meets Friday, December 4, beginning at 8:30 a.m., at Providence Hospital, in Columbia. The group will focus on issues and ongoing questions regarding ICD-10. Additional discussions will include natural language processing as a CDI tool and expanding into hierarchical condition category reviews. RSVP by November 30 to PJ Floyd, at floyp@musc.edu.

Georgia
The Georgia ACDIS Chapter meets, Friday, December 11, 8:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., at Lanier Tech in Cumming. Speakers are currently being sought and the agenda is being finalized. For information, contact Julie Bell at jbell@hhcs.org.