Note from the ACDIS Director: It's time for outpatient CDI to step out on its own

By Brian Murphy

We knew it was going to happen.

Eventually, the ACDIS Conference was going to get so big that we couldn’t give every CDI topic justice or the full coverage it deserved. Outpatient CDI was one of those topics. There is so much going on between Medicare Advantage and Hierarchical Condition Categories (HCCs), the complexities of patients admitted versus treated in observation, to outpatient opportunities in the emergency department and in the physician office setting, that the time had come to give outpatient CDI its own event.

Enter the ACDIS Symposium: Outpatient CDI.

This all-new ACDIS event will be held September 18-19 at the Hilton Oak Brook Resort & Conference Center, located just outside of Chicago.

Back when inpatient CDI was still relatively new in 2007, we received large numbers of basic questions, and there was an overwhelming need for nuts and bolts “how to get started” ideas and education. Because we anticipate the same kinds of concerns at the ACDIS Symposium: Outpatient CDI we are accommodating with three specific ideas:

1. Case studies of how programs have implemented successful outpatient CDI programs. Hear from Cooper University Health Care, Novant Health, Mount Carmel Health System, and others about how they got started, their challenges and their successes.
2. A “Morning Ideas: Lightning Round” general session on Day 1. This innovative one-hour session combines four to five quick-hit, “here was a problem we had and a solution that worked/here is a process that worked for us and might work for you” ideas from your peers that have worked in the field. This will get your brain working overtime!
3. A dedicated Q&A panel session to conclude the program. Ask your top questions at this session—and listen to your peers’ questions. Chances are you might have the same questions.

Just like the ACDIS Conference, the Symposium will feature plenty of networking opportunities and idea-sharing over our breakfasts and lunches (food, including breaks, is provided with registration) as well as in our exhibit hall. Come see the many innovative outpatient CDI solutions several vendors are offering in this space.

There is far more on the agenda than I could mention here—sessions on the nuts and bolts of evaluation and management coding (E/M) and how to improve physician E/M billing, a session on the key differences between inpatient and outpatient coding (as taught by our top coding instructor Shannon McCall, RHIA, CCS, CCS-P, COC, CPC-I, CEMC, CRC, CCDS), and much more.

In short, I hope you can make our inaugural ACDIS Symposium. To learn more or to register, please click here.

Editor’s note: If you have specific questions about the Symposium’s content, please send them to ACDIS Associate Director of Membership and Product Development Rebecca Hendren at rhendren@acdis.org. Murphy is the director of ACDIS. Contact him at bmurphy@acdis.org.