Procedural classification

On April 8, 2025, the National Union of Health Insurance Funds issued an update to the Common Classification of Medical Procedures (CCAM), which serves as a reimbursement nomenclature for medical procedures in hospital and ambulatory settings. Changes include the introduction of new procedure codes, provisional registration of several procedure codes, and modification of existing services. Newly introduced procedure codes concern cardiovascular and peripheral vascular procedures, interventional radiology, ENT, and others. The update takes effect on July 1, 2025.

On December 19, 2023, the updated Finnish classification of procedures (THL) was published to come into force on January 1, 2024. Thirty-two new procedure codes were implemented concerning cardiovascular, endoscopy, neurology, orthopedic, and other fields.

On December 21, 2023, the revised EBM (German Uniform Evaluation Standard) catalog for the first quarter of 2024 was published. The most significant changes concern the update of Annex 2 of the catalog, the introduction of the new EBM codes for external electrical cardioversion in adult and pediatric patients, follow-up and evaluation of the health app companion patella, as well as a companion diagnostics test for genotyping to determine CYP2C19 metabolism status.

On November 16, 2023, the National Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KBV) informed that Annex 2 of the updated German Uniform Evaluation Standard (EBM) catalog, which is expected to be published on January 1, 2024, will be enriched with an additional 33 interventional procedures.

On October 26, 2023, the BfArM (Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices) published the final version of the 2024 OPS procedure coding classification. The OPS, together with the ICD-10-GM (International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th revision, German Modification), forms the basis for the reimbursement systems in outpatient and inpatient care in Germany.

On November 1, 2023, thirteen new procedure codes came into force in the updated Finnish classification of procedures (THL). The introduced codes concerned diagnostic imaging, radiology, neurology, peripheral vascular, and other fields.

In October 2023, the annual update of the Swedish procedure coding system (Classification of Health Care Measures, KVÅ) was released to come into force on January 1, 2024. A total of 70 new surgical procedure codes and 17 new medical procedure codes were introduced concerning endoscopy, ENT, men’s health, nephrology and urology, peripheral vascular, and spine.

In September 2023, NHS England defined the roadmap and key dates for the next version of the OPCS-4 nomenclature of procedures, which is updated every three years. The applications for changes can be submitted no later than December 1, 2024, to be implemented in the OPCS-4.11 version from April 2026.

On August 11, 2024, the BfArM (Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices) published the preliminary version of the 2024 OPS procedure coding classification. The OPS, together with the ICD-10-GM (International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, 10th revision, German Modification), forms the basis for the reimbursement systems in inpatient and outpatient care in Germany.

On July 3, 2023, the document "Changes and innovations in the 2024 LKF model" (Änderungen und Neuerungen in den LKF-Modellen 2024) was published. The document summarizes the most significant changes and innovations in the LKF model for inpatient and outpatient care. The newly added procedure codes mainly concern endoscopic procedures, orthopedics, peripheral vascular, and pulmonary and airways fields.

In February 2023, it was announced that fifty-seven new procedure codes were introduced by the Code Service of the Finnish National Health and Wellbeing Institution (THL). These codes are valid from January 2023. The introduced codes are dedicated to radiology, diagnostic imaging, gastrointestinal, interventional radiology, and some other fields.

In mid-December 2022, the Danish Health Data Agency (Sundhedsdatastyrelsen) published an update of the Health Care Classification System (Sundheds-væsenets Klassifikations System, SKS). The most significant changes include: 11 new diagnosis codes, 27 new procedure codes, and eight additional codes (Tillægskoder) were added. The newly added procedure codes mainly concern the obstetrics and gynecology, surgical procedures, endocrine, gastrointestinal, and radiology fields, and some other technology groups.