Today, U.S. health providers use a system of roughly 14,000 codes to designate a diagnosis for reimbursement purposes and in medical databases. To get more precise, the updated system has about 68,000 codes, essentially an expanded dictionary to capture more of the details from a patient's chart.
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Editor’s note: APMA’s will host an ICD-10 InSight seminar in Dallas on September 27. Also see APMA’s ICD-10 resources on APMA.org.

About 9.9 million people have signed up and paid for health insurance under President Barack Obama's health care law, the administration said Tuesday, a slight dip from a previous count but on track toward the administration's year-end goal of 9.1 million.

White House budget director Shaun Donovan called for a "more aggressive strategy" to thwart improper government payments to doctors, hospitals and insurance companies in a previously undisclosed letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell earlier this year.

The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services has rolled out a new Medicare Advantage Value-Based Insurance Design Model that will be tested in seven states starting in 2017 as a way to trim costs in the treatment of certain chronic conditions.

Having insurance may make it easier to get health care, but that doesn't always translate to medical bills you can afford.

A bunion is a prominent bump near the base of the big toe. The medical term for bunion is hallux valgus. Both men and women can get bunions.

Every morning for more than two years, retired Army Sgt. Brenda Reed had the infuriating chore of screwing on what she calls her "man foot."

"Nail fungus is caused by dermatophytes. Those are fungi that affect the skin and nail. And fungi are found everywhere. It's ubiquitous means it's everywhere in the environment," said Dr. Dane Ulett, a podiatric surgeon.

You don't have to splurge on blister Band-Aids or expensive blister creams — you might have the answer to your poor foot problems in your kitchen cabinet right now!

Living with Type 1 diabetes is neither a fire walk nor a piece of cake. Every day and night watching your blood sugar to keep it in a safe place. Calculating and guessing all day long how everything you do will affect your immediate and long-term survival.

Charting a proper course might lead to a veritable treasure trove of data. Or providers could lose their way and smash into sunken productivity.
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Editor’s note: The APMA Coding Resource Center is a fully integrated subscription online coding and reimbursement resource.

Federal regulators announced a new plan Tuesday to make health care for minority and poor senior citizens more equitable, a challenge that persists 30 years after the Department of Health and Human Services issued a powerful report on the problem.

While recent studies suggest that the rates of diabetes and obesity in the U.S. have finally plateaued, experts say reversing the twin epidemics will require widespread adoption of lifestyle intervention techniques that have been proven to reverse obesity, the cause of most Type 2 diabetes.

A quick rundown on what we know about the leaf-peeping season in Health IT.
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Editor’s note: APMA submitted comments to CMS this week about the physician fee schedule.