Note from the Director: Thanks for a productive 2017!

By Brian D. Murphy

The end of the year and the holiday season is a time to reflect on accomplishments, and give thanks to the colleagues and friends who helped you produce good work and meet professional goals along the way. And the year 2016 will go down as a very productive one for the ACDIS advisory board—and one for which I am very grateful.

 The ACDIS advisory board is an elected/volunteer group of multidisciplinary professionals from the provider and consultant settings who give their time, effort, and energy to improve ACDIS and the broader CDI profession, and to provide ACDIS members with helpful answers, resources, and leadership.

This year the ACDIS advisory board accomplished the following:

• Wrote a position paper “New Definitions of Sepsis and Septic Shock: Response from the ACDIS Advisory Board”: https://acdis.org/resources/new-definitions-sepsis-and-septic-shock-response-acdis-advisory-board
• Wrote a white paper on CDI Productivity “Set CDI productivity expectations, but don’t look for a national standard”: https://acdis.org/resources/set-cdi-productivity-expectations-don%E2%80%99t-look-national-standard
• Wrote a white paper promoting career ladders: “Keep your staff growing an engaged with a CDI career ladder”: https://acdis.org/resources/white-paper-keep-your-staff-growing-and-engaged-cdi-career-ladder
• Wrote a white paper “Outpatient CDI: An Introduction”: https://acdis.org/resources/outpatient-clinical-documentation-improvement-cdi-introduction
• Appeared on six episodes of ACDIS Radio: https://acdis.org/acdis-radio, with a seventh to come next Wednesday, Dec. 28.
• Wrote six “Note from the ACDIS Advisory Board” columns for CDI Journal: https://acdis.org/articles/archive?publication=1
• Presented our first ACDIS advisory board panel session at the 2016 national conference in Atlanta
• Commented to the American Hospital Association (AHA) Coding Clinic and to CMS regarding ICD-10-PCS grouping logic errors: https://acdis.org/resources/statement-acdis-advisory-board-icd-10-pcs-ms-drg-concerns
• Commented to CMS on the 2017 IPPS proposed rule: https://acdis.org/articles/note-advisory-board-acdis-submits-comments-ipps-proposal
• Established a new committee, the CDI Practice Guidelines Committee, which is to begin work in 2017: https://acdis.org/membership/boards#practice
• Participated in four ACDIS quarterly conference calls, covering hot topics and answering questions submitted by the ACDIS membership: https://acdis.org/resources?type=15

This list does not include the many emails to individual ACDIS members, one-on-one phone calls with myself and other members of the ACDIS staff, and spirited behind the scenes debates that contributed to the development of the CDI profession.

I am very grateful for their hard work, and if you’d like to read more about the great group that made it all possible or extend a personal thank you, you can find them here: https://acdis.org/membership/boards#advisory.

ACDIS Advisory Board service is critical to the continued growth of the CDI profession. If you are an ACDIS member and possess the CCDS credential in good standing, and have the time, commitment, and passion to serve, please watch for an email on January 9 detailing how to apply. I would encourage you to read more about what ACDIS advisory board service entails at the link above, and reach out to me or our board members with any questions you may have.

Thanks to all our ACDIS members and in particular to our board and committee members for your hard work this year. And best wishes to you all on a happy and productive 2017.