§ Mr. Paul MarsdenTo ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer which categories of deaths have(a) increased and (b) decreased as a result of changes in the ICD-10 coding for cause of deaths in 2001; and if he will make a statement on the reasons for the changes in coding. [82685]
§ John HealeyThe information requested falls within the responsibility of the National Statistician. I have asked him to reply.
Letter from L. Cook to Mr. Paul Marsden, dated 25 November 2002:
As National Statistician, I have been asked to reply to your recent question asking which categories of deaths have (a) increased and (b) decreased as a result of the changes in the ICD-10 coding for cause of deaths in 2001 and for a statement on the reasons for the changes in coding. (82685)The need to move to ICD-10 to maintain the value of mortality data to users is internationally recognised and it has been introduced in England and Wales on the recommendation of the World Health Organisation (WHO). ICD-10 more closely reflects current medical knowledge than ICD-9, which was developed in the early 1970s, introduced in 1979 and is now out-of-date. Many diseases or conditions that are now of particular interest to medical practitioners, and those working in public health and epidemiology, cannot be adequately classified using ICD-9, for example HIV/AIDS. In addition to this there is widespread demand for more modem data on heart disease and stroke. ICD-10 has been used for the classification of morbidity data in the NHS and in cancer registration since 1995. This created difficulties in comparing morbidity and mortality.A fuller description of the main changes in classification was published in Health Statistics Quarterly, volumes 8 and 13.1,2 Analysis of the numerical impact of the introduction of ICD-10 on a list of 108 major causes of death in England and Wales can be found in Health Statistics Quarterly, volume 1431Rooney C and Smith S. (2000) Implementation of ICD-10 for mortality data in England and Wales form January 2001. Health Statistics Quarterly 8, 41–50.2Rooney C, Griffiths C and Cook L. (2002) The implementation of ICD-10 for cause of death coding— some preliminary results from the bridge coding study. Health Statistics Quarterly 13, 31–41.3Office for National Statistics. (2002) Report: Results of the ICD- 10 bridge coding study, England and Wales, 1999. Health Statistics Quarterly 14, 75–83.