Meet a Member: Mentoring and educating across disciplines

Debra Beisel Denton, RHIA, CCS, CCDS, is the supervisor, HIM system coding educator at Maricopa Integrated Health System in Phoenix, Arizona, and the secretary of the Arizona chapter of ACDIS.

ACDIS Blog: How long have you been in the CDI field?
Denton: I’ve been in CDI for approximately six years, but I have 25 years of experience in coding, billing, and revenue cycle.

ACDIS Blog: What did you do before entering CDI?
Debra: I was in coding management before coming to CDI.

ACDIS Blog: Why did you get into this line of work?
Denton: To me, as a seasoned coder for 20 years, CDI seemed to be the next logical step in my career to work improving clinical documentation for maintaining the integrity of the legal medical record. Every coder wishes documentation would be better to make their job easier for them, so I decided to work toward that goal.

ACDIS Blog: What has been your biggest challenge?
Denton: I think one of the more challenging tasks for both coding and CDI professionals is clinical validation and denials (DRG downgrades). This is a relatively new responsibility that has evolved as CDI programs matured and CDI and coding professionals advance their knowledge and collaboration on clinical care. Working with the medical staff to establish clinical policies and guidelines that they all can agree on helps with this challenge. For instance, going to Sepsis-3 criteria or defining acute kidney injury. Learning how to collaborate with CDI and coders when they see things differently and how to resolve those differences is another area that can be challenging.

ACDIS Blog: What has been your biggest reward?
Denton: My biggest rewards have been associated with being the Arizona Coding Roundtable Coordinator for my AHIMA chapter and the secretary for my ACDIS chapter. I love being a part of both disciplines. CDI and coding are so attached at the hip and the need for collaboration is so important that being involved with both groups helps me understand both worlds better and stay current.

I organized meetings and held some webinars for both coders and CDI specialists that were very rewarding. I love teaching and helping people obtain their career goals to advance themselves, so it’s been really wonderful to help with both of these chapters.

As the Arizona AHIMA Coding Roundtable Coordinator, I organized monthly roundtable meetings, offered CCS prep courses, did a PCS refresher course and created study groups.

The best part of my job at Maricopa is working with students in their internships. We are in the beginning steps at Maricopa of starting an apprenticeship program for coding and I am very excited about that.

ACDIS Blog: How has the field changed since you began working in CDI?
Denton: I believe the biggest change in CDI is expanding scope beyond finding CCs and MCCs and being involved in the next level of looking at quality concerns with patient safety indicators, hospital acquired conditions, and denials. The movement into outpatient CDI is another evolution for CDI that I think is very much needed for the industry.

ACDIS Blog: Can you mention a few of the “gold nuggets” of information you’ve received from colleagues on The Forum or through ACDIS?
Denton: The ACDIS website is so full of good information to help get your questions answered and connect with other CDI professionals. The quarterly membership conference calls are very beneficial to hear from CDI physicians and other highly respected professionals in the industry on questions that have been submitted by members. I find “golden nuggets” all the time especially talking and communicating on the ACDIS Forum. I really appreciate ACDIS Advisory Board member Paul Evans’ insight and perspective, especially since he is a coder and CDI specialist like me.

ACDIS Blog: If you have attended, how many ACDIS conferences have you been to? What are your favorite memories?
Denton: I’ve been to at least four ACDIS conferences. Every year the conferences get better and better. My favorite meeting was in San Antonio just because there were many of my peers from Arizona there so lots of networking and fun times took place. I learn so much and have many opportunities to ask questions.

ACDIS Blog: What piece of advice would you offer to a new CDI specialist?
Denton: I have a few pieces of advice. First, be patient. Also, networking is important. Become a member of ACDIS, join your local chapter of ACDIS right away, and ask lots of questions. Collaborate with coding to learn all you can about the Official Guidelines for Coding and Reporting and PCS coding which can be the most difficult for CDI specialists to learn.

ACDIS Blog: If you could have any other job, what would it be?
Denton: I’ve asked this question to myself many times because I’ve never done anything else but be in the HIM/coding and billing profession. I’m not sure what else I could do. I have just signed up to get my CICA certification as an inpatient auditor and I’m taking the CDIP test in March. The only other thing I could think of would be to teach coding full-time.

ACDIS Blog: What was your first job?
Denton: I have been in the healthcare industry all of my career in many different branches and facets of the business—from billing companies, to laboratories, ED facilities, professional fee coding, long term acute care facilities, and physician office management. I have worked on contract doing both coding and CDI in several facilities in Michigan, Arizona, and California. But my career started in a high school co-op, learning medical transcribing. Then I worked at Travelers Insurance company. Back then, I actually typed billing claim forms and worked with keypunch cards.

ACDIS Blog: Tell us about a few of your favorite things:

Denton: My most favorite thing to do is spend time with my grandchildren. I have three children, one son and two daughters. I love spending time with all my adult children and my grandchildren. One of my desires some day is to go to Disneyworld with the whole family and grandchildren. Taking short weekend girls’ trips with my daughters and daughter-in-law is another thing I would love to do more of.

Coding and CDI has been my lifelong career and I love it. I look back at all the different branches of healthcare that I have been involved in and every step and opportunity I learned so many new things and I’m so grateful for all the opportunities I’ve had. I am a lifelong learner and enjoy learning new things and new ways of looking at things.

• Vacation spot: I love going to botanical gardens and love gardening and growing flowers, but I haven’t been able to do much of that living in Arizona.
  Hobby: Cross-stitching and playing bingo
• Non-alcoholic beverage: Strawberry ice tea
• Foods: Mexican and Chinese
• Activity: Swimming and walking when I can.