The International Classification of Diseases (ICD) has been the basis for comparable statistics on causes of mortality and morbidity between places and over time.
- The ICD is maintained by the World Health Organization.
- Originating in the 19th century, the latest version of the ICD, ICD-11, was adopted by the 72nd World Health Assembly in 2019 and came into effect on 1st January 2022.
- ICD-11 is a legally mandated health data standard.
- The International Classification serves to record and report health and health-related conditions globally.
- ICD ensures interoperability of digital health data, and their comparability. The ICD contains diseases, disorders, health conditions and much more.
- The inclusion of a specific category into ICD depends on utility to the different uses of ICD and sufficient evidence that a health condition exists.
- ICD-11 enables, for the first time, the counting of traditional medicine services and encounters.
Traditional medicine
- Traditional medicine is an area of healthcare in many Member States, and traditional practitioners, traditional knowledge.
- Traditional medicines are mentioned in the Declaration of Alma-Ata on Primary Health Care (1978) and the declaration of Astana as part of the provision of primary health care.
- There is a separate Chapter within the International Classification of Diseases-11 (ICD-11) for optional use. It provides a list of diagnostics categories to collect and report on Traditional Medicine conditions in a standardized and international comparable manner.
- The scope of the chapter is currently covering traditional medicine conditions which originated in ancient China and are now commonly used in China, Japan, Korea and elsewhere around the world (Module I).
- This Traditional Medicine chapter is a formative step for the integration of Traditional Medicine conditions into a classification standard used in conventional medicine.
- The Traditional Medicine Chapter is neither judging nor endorsing the scientific validity of any Traditional Medicine practice or the efficacy of any Traditional Medicine intervention.
- Development of a Module 2 which derived from Ayurveda and related Traditional Medicine diagnostic systems has started.
