Mapping three versions of the international classification of diseases to categories of chronic conditions

INTRODUCTION: Administrative health data capture diagnoses using the International Classification of Diseases (ICD), which has multiple versions over time. To facilitate longitudinal investigations using these data, we aimed to map diagnoses identified in three ICD versions – ICD-8 with adaptations (ICDA-8), ICD-9 with clinical modifications (ICD-9-CM), and ICD-10 with Canadian adaptations (ICD-10-CA) – to mutually exclusive chronic health condition categories adapted from the open source Clinical Classifications Software (CCS). METHODS: We adapted the CCS crosswalk to 3-digit ICD-9-CM codes for chronic conditions and resolved the one-to-many mappings in ICD-9-CM codes. Using this adapted CCS crosswalk as the reference and referring to existing crosswalks between ICD versions, we extended the mapping to ICDA-8 and ICD-10-CA. Each mapping step was conducted independently by two reviewers and discrepancies were resolved by consensus through deliberation and reference to prior research. We report the frequencies, agreement percentages and 95% confidence intervals (CI) from each step. RESULTS: We identified 354 3-digit ICD-9-CM codes for chronic conditions. Of those, 77 (22%) codes had one-to-many mappings; 36 (10%) codes were mapped to a single CCS category and 41 (12%) codes were mapped to combined CCS categories. In total, the codes were mapped to 130 adapted CCS categories with an agreement percentage of 92% (95% CI: 86%–98%). Then, 321 3-digit ICDA-8 codes were mapped to CCS categories with an agreement percentage of 92% (95% CI: 89%–95%). Finally, 3583 ICD-10-CA codes were mapped to CCS categories; 111 (3%) had a fair or poor mapping quality; these were reviewed to keep or move to another category (agreement percentage = 77% [95% CI: 69%–85%]). CONCLUSIONS: We developed crosswalks for three ICD versions (ICDA-8, ICD-9-CM, and ICD-10-CA) to 130 clinically meaningful categories of chronic health conditions by adapting the CCS classification. These crosswalks will benefit chronic disease studies spanning multiple decades of administrative health data.