Health professionals & data managers equipped to drive accurate health data coding with ICD-11

In a bid to strengthen national capacity in the use of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-11) for accurate, standardized, and interoperable health data coding, a five-day training workshop was held at the University of Rwanda. The training brought together health professionals, including clinicians, data managers, and monitoring and evaluation specialists from institutions such as the Ministry of Health, Rwanda Social Security Board, University of Rwanda, and Rwanda Biomedical Centre, among others.

The workshop was organized through a collaboration between the Ministry of Health, the University of Rwanda, and the World Health Organization, aiming to build a critical mass of skilled professionals who will operationalize and sustain ICD-11 implementation in Rwanda’s health system.

Speaking during the training, Prof. Emile Rwamasirabo highlighted past challenges associated with disease coding. He noted that clinicians often found data entry burdensome, with some resisting the process altogether. Identifying the correct codes under ICD-10 was time-consuming and interfered with clinical duties, particularly given the demands of patient care. This challenge underscored the need to train dedicated coding professionals, at a time when the country had limited capacity to do so.

Prof. Rwamasirabo, Urological Surgeon, educator and healthcare manager with over 35 years of experience further explained that the introduction of ICD-11 has significantly addressed these challenges. He described the new system as more user-friendly, comprehensive, and better aligned with the practical needs of clinicians, making disease coding faster and more efficient.

The training was facilitated by experts including Dr Islam Ibrahim, a professional trainer affiliated with the World Health Organization’s Family of International Classifications (FIC) Network. She emphasized that ICD-10 was not user-friendly, as it often required extensive time to identify the correct codes, involving consultation of multiple manuals and guidelines.

“With ICD-10, it could take up to two years in countries like Australia to become a certified coder. ICD-11 was developed to address these limitations and simplify the coding process,” she explained.

The International Classification of Diseases (ICD) serves as a global standard for classifying diseases, injuries, and causes of death, enabling the production of comparable mortality and morbidity statistics across countries and over time. The latest version, ICD-11, adopted by the World Health Assembly in 2019 and implemented globally from January 2022, offers enhanced interoperability and is designed for seamless integration with digital health systems, significantly improving coding accuracy and efficiency.
Logistical arrangements for the training were coordinated by the University of Rwanda’s Single Project Implementation Unit.

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