Australian Mortality Coding: History, Benefits and Future Directions.

Introduction The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), Australia’s national statistical agency, processes around 130,000 deaths annually, using an automated coding system (ACS). The Mortality Medical Data System (MMDS) allows the classification of multiple causes of death in accordance with the current version of the International Classification of Diseases (ICD). This results in the coding of every condition mentioned on a death certificate as contributing to the death. Multiple cause coding is best defined as: ...the coding of all morbid conditions, diseases and injuries entered on the death certificate, including those involved in the morbid train of events leading to the death which were classified as either the underlying cause, the intermediate cause, or any intervening causes, and those conditions which contributed to death but were not related to the disease or condition causing death (Australian Bureau of Statistics 2006: p. 88). The ABS implemented the MMDS system during 1997, after considerable research and testing using ICD-9 (World Health Organization 1975) and the subsequent introduction from 1999 of ICD-10 (World Health Organization 1984). The two previous years of data (1997 and 1998) were ‘back coded’ in ICD-10. All deaths occurring within Australia, registered from 1 January 1997, have been multiple cause coded in ICD-10.