A Note from the Associate Editorial Director: A birds-eye view of ACDIS publications

by Melissa Varnavas

At our office in Middleton, we sit beside a row of windows overlooking a parking lot and—at the moment—rolling hills of autumnal foliage shrouded in mist. About an hour ago, a big ‘ole crow landed on the window ledge and poked at each window pane before spreading its blue-black wings and sailing off to a nearby tree.

So, I thought I’d spend this note “crowing” about the publications available to ACDIS members and let you know about a few items coming in the next month or so.

In case you missed it, the September/October edition of the CDI Journal, covers a number of controversial concerns including:

• The professional background of CDI specialists
• The state licensure needs for nurses in CDI
• Changes to Official Guidelines for Coding and Reporting
• Tips for appealing denials
• Sepsis-3 in the pediatric realm

Speaking of Sepsis-3, ACDIS Advisory Board member Paul Evans, RHIA, CCDS, CCS, CCS-P, delves into some thoughts about addressing reviews and queries in the white paper “How ‘R’ are you coding severe sepsis? Why the R-code matters.” In it, Evans reviews the various clinical guidelines for sepsis diagnosis as well as coding and documentation requirements. He offers case study examples of situations CDI professionals may very well face within their typical record reviews and provides some query examples.

ACDIS white papers are in-depth articles which discuss CDI best practice, advances new ideas, increases knowledge, or offers administrative simplification. It is less formal than a position paper, so as Evans writes in this release, his aim is to simply “review some of the aspects of differing definitions of severe sepsis and demonstrate why the coding of severe sepsis is important while providing some practical tips.”

Another white paper released just this week focuses on the need for a consensus of clinical definitions related to pediatric respiratory failure. A work group consisting of coders, pediatric nurses, physicians, and CDI professionals from the ACDIS membership met over the course of a year to review data from the field and coalesce various documentation conundrums those working in this area face.

“The lack of specific clinical criteria for the diagnosis of acute respiratory failure in the pediatric population, without intubation or arterial blood gas measurements, have led to the development of numerous institution-specific criteria for this disease,” the work group states.

While the white paper outlines prevailing CDI-related concerns, provides clinical scenarios, and offers some suggested actions. It also seeks additional insight and clarity from the institutions, such as The Society of Critical Care Medicine and The Society of Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, regarding clinical definitions of pediatric respiratory related diagnoses.

Finally, I very much enjoyed working with our friends over in HealthLeaders Media on a special section titled “From Finance to Quality: CDI Departments Expanding Their Reach,” in its most recent magazine.

Many CDI program leaders agonize over how to make the case for expanding their program efforts into quality-related record reviews, says Dee Banet, RN, MSN, CCDS, CDIP, director of CDI at Norton Healthcare in Louisville, Kentucky, and a past ACDIS Advisory Board member in the report. And yet, as government increasingly ties payment to quality with initiatives like pay-for-performance, the dividing line between patient care and fiscal concerns is slowly dissolving.

These highlights represent just a few of the items recently released by ACDIS. Members of the ACDIS Advisory Board have nearly completed work on a special white paper regarding career ladder creation in the field as well as a new report based on survey data regarding CDI productivity expectations. And, the 2016 CDI Salary Survey garnered more than 1,000 responses this year. So, no doubt, CDI professionals will be excited to dig into that data once the analysis is released later this month!

Now that’s something to crow about!

Editor’s note: Varnavas is the Associate Editorial Director for ACDIS with responsibilities related to its various publications and website offerings as well as the more than 40 local chapters across the country. Contact her at mvarnavas@acdis.org.