WellPoint Selects Health Language, Inc. to Facilitate Transition to ICD-10 and Support its Long-term Mission for Improved Quality of Care

HLI’s LEAP I-10 enables WellPoint to achieve ICD-10 compliance, enhance ongoing clinical documentation and foster provider collaboration

DENVER--()--Health Language, Inc. (HLI), the global leader in medical terminology management, today announced that WellPoint has selected HLI and its LEAP I-10 solution to facilitate its transition to full ICD-10 compliance. The partnership also supports WellPoint’s long-term vision of improved quality of care through enhanced comparative data analysis and provider collaboration.

LEAP I-10 allows WellPoint to successfully translate between ICD-9 and ICD-10, and includes general equivalency mappings (GEMs), Medicare Severity-Diagnosis Related Groups (MS-DRGs) and other critical content. As a result, WellPoint is able to:

  • Automate workflow for mapping between ICD-9 and ICD-10;
  • Establish controls around translation decisions during system configuration and policy renovation;
  • Identify accurate and appropriate usage of ICD-10 codes to support quality initiatives and claims adjudication;
  • Target analytics renovation to improve insight into population and individual patient health immediately following the ICD-10 go-live and to assist in the development of more targeted disease and care management programs.

“Our work with Health Language looks beyond simple compliance with ICD-10 to the inherent value of the expanded code sets,” said Ian Bonnet, vice president of WellPoint. “ICD-10 provides more detail about the diagnoses of and services provided to our members. LEAP I-10 is helping us renovate our business rules and analytics to better monitor and act on predictive indicators and to improve quality and care programs for all our customers.”

WellPoint selected LEAP I-10 because of the product’s technical capabilities, HLI’s core competency in terminology asset management, and HLI’s experience in both the payer and provider markets. The implementation of LEAP I-10 aligns with the long-term goals and vision that WellPoint has for fully transitioning from ICD-9 to ICD-10 code sets.

In particular, HLI’s familiarity with the provider space adds to WellPoint’s collaboration with providers on testing and organizational continuity. LEAP I-10 helps facilitate this collaboration by providing transparency into the forward and reverse ICD-9 and ICD-10 maps used in the renovation process.

“We admire WellPoint’s understanding of the bigger picture and vision for better quality of care,” said George Schwend, CEO and president of HLI. “Through our partnership, we plan to offer WellPoint and its provider network richer sources of data for ongoing clinical research, resulting in a reduction of data and test duplications, and enhanced administrative efficiencies.”

WellPoint implemented the software in 2011 and continues to increase their usage of the solution as they dive deeper into their remediation efforts.

To learn more about the collaboration between HLI and WellPoint, attend HIMSS Lecture 13, “The Importance of Provider/Payer Collaboration in Successful ICD-10-CM/PCS Migrations.” The lecture, lead by Bonnet and Levy, is scheduled for Tuesday, Feb. 21, from 9:45 a.m. to 10:45 a.m. in room Murano 3306.

About Health Language, Inc.

Denver-based Health Language, Inc. (HLI) develops and delivers state-of-the-art software solutions that automatically incorporate medical vocabulary and coding standards into healthcare information technology applications. HLI’s Language Engine (LE) allows centralized access to medical terminology standards and generates mappings to create a common pool of standardized codes and concepts that enhance patient safety, facilitate clinical outcomes analysis and accelerate reimbursement. It also provides standards for modeling, storing, updating and distributing information consistently for interoperability between hospitals, regions and countries. For more information, visit www.healthlanguage.com or call 720.940.2900.

WellPoint, Inc.

WellPoint works to simplify the connection between Health, Care and Value. We help to improve the health of our members and our communities, and provide greater value to our customers and shareholders. WellPoint is one of the nation’s largest health benefits companies, with 34 million members in its affiliated health plans, and a total of more than 65 million individuals served through its subsidiaries. As an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association, WellPoint serves members as the Blue Cross licensee for California; the Blue Cross and Blue Shield licensee for Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Maine, Missouri (excluding 30 counties in the Kansas City area), Nevada, New Hampshire, New York (as the Blue Cross Blue Shield licensee in 10 New York City metropolitan and surrounding counties and as the Blue Cross or Blue Cross Blue Shield licensee in selected upstate counties only), Ohio, Virginia (excluding the Northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C.), and Wisconsin. In a majority of these service areas, WellPoint’s plans do business as Anthem Blue Cross, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia, Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield, or Empire Blue Cross (in the New York service areas). WellPoint also serves customers throughout the country as UniCare and in certain California, Arizona and Nevada markets through our recently acquired CareMore Health Group, Inc. subsidiary. Additional information about WellPoint is available at www.wellpoint.com.

Contacts

For Health Language, Inc. (HLI)
Dodge Communications
Leslie Kirk, 770-576-2576
lkirk@dodgecommunications.com

Release Summary

Health Language, Inc. today announced that WellPoint has selected HLI and its LEAP I-10 solution to facilitate its transition to full ICD-10 compliance.

Contacts

For Health Language, Inc. (HLI)
Dodge Communications
Leslie Kirk, 770-576-2576
lkirk@dodgecommunications.com