What is the Difference Between ICD-10 and ICD-11?

In June 2018, the World Health Organization published the 11th revision of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11). For more than 10 years of work on the document, experts from around the world have proposed about 10,000 changes. The ICD-10 was adopted in 1990 and the new 11th version is quite drastic.

Why change something? Are there any new diseases?

Yes, there are. Scientists are discovering new diseases, the knowledge of old ones is changing, but this is not the only reason. The ICD is an important tool that allows you to understand how common various diseases are, what are the causes of death and how the situation changes.

In ICD, everything is coded in a certain way. Using the code, it is much easier to compare data from different hospitals and countries – you can be sure that all cases are taken into account and nothing important is missed just because the disease is called differently in different countries.

Sometimes, it is also important for insurance companies.

Does the 11th version contain more diseases?

Yes. The ICD-10 contained 14400 items. There are 55,000 in the ICD-11, but this does not mean that four times more diseases have appeared: The international classification of diseases also includes circumstances affecting health. For example, dissatisfaction with the situation at school and low levels of personal hygiene.

Changing the number of items in the ICD is considered extremely useful because it allows researchers and health care organizers to have a more complete picture. For example, in ICD-11 all types of diabetes are described in detail (there are more than two of them). Diseases that occur on the background of HIV infection have a special code. Rare genetic diseases are now encoded separately. There is also a section “Objects involved in the injury”, which includes not only weapons or other equally dangerous things, but also marsupials, wrist watches, a comb, and so on. In other words, with the help of ICD-1, doctors can literally encode any event in your life that affected health.

What about other changes?

There are a lot of changes, but the doctors mainly mention the following:

• excessive enthusiasm for video games was recognized as a health disorder;
• “transsexualism” and other “gender identity disorders” are no longer related to mental and behavioral disorders. They are mentioned in a new section on sexual health. The new name is “gender mismatch.” This reflects the current understanding of this condition and will help to simultaneously remove stigma and not deny people medical care if they need it.

Less discussed changes include:

• the diagnosis of “hermaphroditism” has disappeared. Now this condition is referred to as a violation of gender formation;
• a pedophilic disorder appeared in the ICD instead of pedophilia. It can be diagnosed only if the person is very anxious about his preferences or moves to actions;
• there appeared a disorder associated with the violation of the integrity of one’s body perception – when a person wants to lose his/her sight, limbs or become paralyzed;
• there appeared a section on traditional medicine. WHO justifies this by saying that it is easier to monitor the effects of such methods on health. At the same time, the organization separately explains that such innovation does not indicate that WHO recognized traditional medicine as effective.

How does all this affect us?

From January 1, 2022, all countries will have to apply ICD-11: doctors will not indicate new codes in medical records, statistics will be based on this.

ICD-11: International Classification of Diseases: 11th revision

01 Certain infectious or parasitic diseases
02 Neoplasm
03 Diseases of the blood or blood-forming organs
04 Diseases of the immune system
05 Endocrine, nutritional or metabolic diseases
06 Mental, behavioral, or neurodevelopmental disorders
07 Sleep Disorders
08 Diseases of the nervous system
09 Diseases of the visual system
10 Diseases of the ear or mastoid
11 Diseases of the circulatory system
12 Diseases of the respiratory system
13 Diseases of the digestive system
14 skin diseases
15 Diseases of the musculoskeletal system or connective tissue
16 Diseases of the genitourinary system
17 Conditions related to sexual health.
18 Pregnancy, childbirth or the postpartum period.
19 Some conditions arising in the perinatal period.
20 Developmental anomalies
21 Symptoms, signs or clinical findings not elsewhere classified.
22 Trauma, poisoning or some other consequences of external causes.
23 External causes of morbidity or mortality
24 Factors affecting health or contact with health services.
25 Codes for special purposes
26 States of Traditional Medicine — Module I

V Additional section for performance evaluation
X Extension codes