Tri-7 Wk6 Day 424, Tuesday, Test & ICD-9

Knocked out our first GIUG exam today. Dr. Kuhn's exams are always interesting. The first 30 questions alternated between multiple choice and matching and the last 10 questions were all fill in the blank. No grades posted yet but I think I did pretty decent.

Yesterday's Endocrinology exam didn't seem to go as well. I have to figure something out with taking notes in that class. After almost three years at Logan I have a pretty well established system for taking notes on my laptop but, for some reason, we're not allowed to use any electronic devices in that class. My grades seem to be well correlated to the quantity & quality of my notes from class and, I just didn't have much for that class except some random pieces of paper I was able to scrounge up before class. It was a brief test, only 20 questions and only a little over half related to things I had studied. I think I know more than the grade will bear out. We'll see.

Tomorrow is our first Geriatrics exam. Wow - 11 p.m. already, I need to get to bed soon. I did make it to the gym tonight again and the place was packed.

I saw one patient today and have all of my available appointment slots maxed out for Thursday which is very cool! :) I liked the appointment I had today and things went well enough that I didn't feel like flushing my head down the toilet when I finished which, is always nice. It's kind of a huge transition going from books to people. I guess, like with studying, it can be an extra challenge to try to figure so much out on my own since I'm so far away from school that there isn't an over abundance of studying or interaction with people from school outside of regular class hours. Non-the-less, I have been able to pick up a few things from some of my classmates that should help. I was also thinking of spending some extra time with my patient's files to become more familiar with everything. One thing I'd like to do is compile a list of all the ICD-9 codes we're using for diagnosis.

ICD stands for International Classification of Diseases or, more completely perhaps, as the International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems.

Most of the world uses ICD-10 which was started in 1983 and completed in 1992 but Medicare and Medicaid claims have been using ICD-9 since 1988 so, that's what we still use today. ICD 11 is in the works.

Basically, ICD has a numerical number reference for every disease. ICD 10 contains more than 155,000 different codes. Starting with our class, we now have to enter in a code for every diagnosis.

This is great - I found an ICD-9 application for my iPad with a search feature and every single ICD code! :) 524.6, for example, is for temporomandibular joint disorders which, I've used today and now that I'm looking at my new iPad app, I'm thinking a code of 524.64 would have been a bit more accurate :) Oh well, I'm learning :) Wow, there's even a section for Procedures. 00.09 is for Ultrasound (which I did today also) :) Man, this looks like a great app, there's even a favorites section so all I have to do is compile a list of all the codes I've used recently, look them up and then put them in my favorites section for super easy access! :)