> when I asked an old timer about the IDC field format, I was told they were that way "because that's how they were on the previous paper forms." That's not ac

> when I asked an old timer about the IDC field format, I was told they were that way "because that's how they were on the previous paper forms." That's not actually surprising, since the current insurance/billing situation easily predates the prevalence of EMRs (the recency of which those of us in the computer industry may have forgotten). > But this is prolly a bit of a tangent. Standardized forms and coding are actually a huge benefit to efficiency. I don't doubt standardization is a boon to efficiency by some measure. However, it doesn't necessarily translate into better medicine (which was my tangent). Less tangentially, it may not translate to cost savings, especially for a cash-only business, where it may be merely a premature optimization. Least tangentially, there's little reason to believe that continuing with existing standards, skewed toward insurance/billing (which I admit more describes CPT than ICD), is more efficient for a cash-only provider than an alternative.