Possible ICD-10 Delay Nets Widespread Physician Support

Those financial pressures, AMA said, come as physicians are also coping with:

• the switch to mandated electronic medical records;
• the transition to 5010 HIPAA transaction standards;
• confusion over the requirements—and legal status—of the Affordable Care Act;
• the push for Accountable Care Organizations, patient-centered medical homes, bundled payments, and other new care and compensation models;
• the unsettled status of Sustainable Growth Rate funding in the Medicare "doc fix"   

AMA President-elect, Jeremy A. Lazarus, MD, said in a statement Tuesday that the nation's largest physicians' organization "welcomes the opportunity to discuss ICD-10 implementation, along with many overlapping regulatory requirements that are burdening physician practices."

"The AMA appreciates that Ms. Tavenner and the administration have heard our concerns and have recognized the significant challenges and burdens ICD-10 implementation will create on the practice of medicine, and that they are committed to reviewing the pace of implementation," Lazarus said.

Pam McNutt, CIO and senior vice president at Methodist Health System in Dallas, TX, told HealthLeaders Media that providers are simply overwhelmed by the federal mandates raining down on their heads.

"All of that is happening in the same timeframe and they are all interwoven. It really seems like it is almost too much, especially when you think about it from the physicians' perspective," McNutt says.