Validation of ICD-10 codes for studying foreign body airway obstructions: A health administrative data cohort study

AIM: To validate a case definition for foreign body airway obstructions (FBAO) using International Classification of Diseases version 10 (ICD-10) codes to accurately identify patients in administrative health databases and improve reporting on this injury. METHODS: We identified prehospital patient encounters in Alberta, Canada between Jan 1, 2018 and Dec 31, 2021 by querying the provincial emergency medical services’ (EMS) patient care records for FBAO-related presentations, EMS protocols, or treatments. We deterministically linked EMS patient encounters to data on emergency department visits and hospital admissions, which included ICD-10 codes. Two physicians independently reviewed encounters to determine true FBAO cases. We then calculated diagnostic accuracy measures (sensitivity, specificity, likelihood ratios) of various algorithms. RESULTS: We identified 3677 EMS patient encounters, 2121 were linked to hospital administrative databases. Of these encounters, 825 (38.9%) were true FBAO. The combination of two ICD-10 codes (T17 = foreign body in the respiratory tract or T18.0 = foreign body in the mouth) was the most specific algorithm (96.9% [95%CI 95.8–97.8%]), while the combination of all FBAO-related ICD-10 codes and R06.8 (other breathing abnormalities) was the most sensitive (75.0% [95%CI 71.9–78.0]). We identified an additional 453 (35.4%) FBAO cases not transported by EMS (due to death or transport refusal), and therefore not linked to the hospital administrative databases. Of these unlinked encounters, 44 (9.7%) cases resulted in the patient’s death. CONCLUSIONS: FBAO can be identified with reasonable accuracy using health administrative data and ICD-10 codes. All algorithms had a trade-off between sensitivity and specificity, and failed to identify a third of FBAO cases, of which 10% resulted in death.