TERMS
THAT DON'T ADEQUATELY IDENTIFY UNDERLYING CAUSE OF DEATH
Certain terms should not be reported as the only causes of death
because they do not identify the underlying cause of death. These terms describe only symptoms, signs of
illness, ill-defined terms, plus secondary conditions.
You may think a term is adequate because the insurance company
accepted it for billing purposes. Death
certificates don’t have the same reporting criteria as insurance forms or
medical records. The insurance company
may accept a diagnosis as the reason for medical care, but that condition may
not adequately identify the cause of death for the death certificate. For example, a terminal diagnosis of “failure
to thrive” is adequate for admission to hospice care. However, “failure to thrive” by itself does
not identify the underlying cause of death.
If symptoms, signs of illness, ill defined terms or secondary conditions
are reported on the death certificate, report what caused them.
The following types of conditions don’t identify the underlying
cause of death. If one or more of these
conditions are the only causes of death reported, you have not adequately
identified the underlying cause of death:
·
Conditions
that have a broad differential diagnosis:
These are conditions that could have been caused by many different
diseases or injuries. Examples are
congestive heart failure, pneumonia, and anoxia.
·
Conditions
that are symptoms, signs, or complications of other diseases.
·
Conditions
classified to ICD-9 codes 780.0-799.9 or ICD-10 “R” codes.
·
Mechanisms
of death, also known as “modes of dying”:
These are functional defects, organ failures, and agonal events common
to most or deaths, such as cardiac arrest, respiratory failure, asystole, and
electromechanical dissociation.
It is very important to report the underlying cause
of death on each death certificate.
"Underlying cause of death" is defined as "The disease
or injury which initiated the train of morbid events leading directly to death
or the circumstances of the accident or violence which produced the fatal
injury."
The terms in the following list do not identify the
underlying cause of death. They identify only symptoms or signs of disease, or
ill-defined conditions (conditions in ICD-9 codes 7800-7999) or modes of death (that say how but not why
death occurred) or they are secondary conditions that don't identify the
primary condition.
IF YOU REPORT ANY OF THE FOLLOWING CONDITIONS, IDENTIFY WHAT
CAUSED IT. This is
not an all-inclusive list.
If one
(or more) of the following conditions is (are) the only condition(s) reported
on the death certificate, you have not adequately identified the underlying
cause of death.
*"Unknown/unspec. natural causes" should be
used only if even a probable cause of death is unknown, and attempts to get
cause of death information from other sources (primary care physician,
caregivers, medical records, etc.) have resulted in no further information.
