ICD10 Guideline for drugs and substances

This page contains an ICD10 Coding Guideline for ICD10 collection. See ICD10 coding guidelines for similar pages.

Regarding overdose/toxicity from multiple agents

Code all the agents known to have been taken
In the case where some are known but others are suspected then also use Drug or biological substance/agent NOS, overdose/poisoning for those others suspected
When there is a multi-agent overdose and none of the agents are clearly known, then just code Drug or biological substance/agent NOS, overdose/poisoning
Also code ALL the physiologic/lab/etc manifestations of the overdose (e.g. renal failure, respiratory failure, shock, etc).
Regarding choosing the single primary admit diagnosis in overdose cases:
- In general code the manifestation of the overdose that is most responsible for admission (e.g. if the agent caused renal failure AND shock, code the shock as primary as it's most immediately life threatening)
- If the admission is just to observe them (i.e. perhaps he took a dangerous agent but does not YET have a physiologic manifestation requiring admission) then code as primary Observation for SUSPECTED overdose
When the primary admission is for the overdoses, it's often unclear which ONE agent to code -- so as usual, try to pick the agent that is is most likely causing the most serious physiologic derangement.

Coding in ICD10 of Issues Related to Drugs and Substances

There are 6 categories of ICD10 codes related to drugs/biologics/agents/substances -- they are DISTINCT and it’s important to distinguish between them.

While many of the specific drugs or agents or substances have codes that fall under multiple of the categories (e.g. opioids), there is not perfect symmetry, i.e. there may be an individual code for a given agent in one category, while for another category that agent may instead go into a wastebasket code. Benzodiazepines are one such example.

Intravenous Drug Abuse (IVDA)

There is no specific code in ICD10 for intravenous drug use/abuse (ivda). The codes that DO exist are for the specific agent or type of agent being used/abused --- irrespective of how it enters the body.

Other instructions related to drugs and substances in IC10

Several templates area applied to the relevant pages:

See Category:Drug and substance template