simple-icd-10 1.3.2

A simple python library for ICD-10 codes

simple_icd_10

A simple python library for ICD-10 codes

Index

• Release notes
• Introduction
• Setup
• What a code is and how it looks like
• Memoization
• Documentation
  • is_valid_item(code)
  • is_valid_code(code)
  • is_chapter_or_block(code)
  • get_description(code)
  • get_descendants(code)
  • get_ancestors(code)
  • is_descendant(a,b)
  • is_ancestor(a,b)
  • get_nearest_common_ancestor(a,b)
  • get_all_codes(keep_dots)
  • get_index(code)
  • disable_memoization()
  • enable_memoization()
  • reset_memoization()
• Conclusion

Release notes

• 1.3.1: Huge performance improvements, bug fix
• 1.3.0: Additional major performance improvements
• 1.2.1: Minor fix to ensure the integrity of the data
• 1.2.0: Added memoization to achieve high performance improvements
• 1.1: Added the function "get_nearest_common_ancestor"
• 1.0: Initial release

Introduction

The scope of this library is to provide a simple instrument for dealing with ICD-10 codes in your Python projects. It provides ways to check whether a code exists, to find its ancestors and descendants, to see its description and much more.
The codes and their descriptions were taken from this page in the WHO's website and are referred to the 2019 version of ICD-10.

You can find the all the codes and their descriptions in plain text in the "data" folder.

Setup

You can either use the "simple_icd_10.py" file that contains all the source code, or install the package with pip, using this command:

pip install simple-icd-10

What a code is and how it looks like

We need to start by clarifying what a code is for us. The ICD-10 instruction manual makes a distinction between chapters, block of categories, three-character categories and four-character subcategories (which from now on we'll refer to as chapters, blocks, categories and subcategories), with a few additional five-character subcategories: we will consider all these items as codes.
That said, this library includes ways to make distinctions between the first two kinds of codes (chapters and blocks) and the other two kinds of codes (categories and subcategories); while making this distinction we may consider only categories and subcategories to be "codes", while we may use "items" as a more general term. However, in every other circumstance the definition of "code" is the more inclusive one.

Generally speaking, the codes of subcategories can be written in two different ways: with a dot (for example "I13.1") and without the dot (for example "I131"). The functions in this library can receive as input codes in both these formats. The codes returned by the functions will always be in the format without the dot.

Memoization

Since version 1.2.0, this library uses memoization to improve the speed of several functions. While I suggest you always keep it enabled because of the great performance improvements that it brings, you are provided with functions to disable and re-enable it as you wish.

Documentation

Here I will list all the functions provided by this library and describe how to use them. If you are interested in a more interactive introduction to simple_icd_10, please take a look at the Jupyter Notebook "Showcase notebook.ipynb"; there you can also find more examples.

Here we suppose we have imported the library as follows:

import simple_icd_10 as icd

is_valid_item(code)

This function takes a string as input and returns True if the string is a valid chapter, block, category or subcategory in ICD-10, False otherwise.

icd.is_valid_item("cat")
#False
icd.is_valid_item("B99")
#True

is_valid_code(code)

This function takes a string as input and returns True if the string is a valid category or subcategory in ICD-10, False otherwise.

icd.is_valid_code("A00-B99")
#False
icd.is_valid_code("B99")
#True

is_chapter_or_block(code)

This function takes a string as input and returns True if the string is a valid chapter or block in ICD-10, False otherwise.

icd.is_chapter_or_block("A00-B99")
#True
icd.is_chapter_or_block("B99")
#False

get_description(code)

This function takes a string as input. If the string is a valid ICD-10 code, it returns a string with its short description, otherwise it raises a ValueError.

icd.get_description("XII")
#"Diseases of the skin and subcutaneous tissue"
icd.get_description("F00")
#"Dementia in Alzheimer disease"

get_descendants(code)

This function takes a string as input. If the string is a valid ICD-10 code, it returns a list containing all its descendants in the ICD-10 classification, otherwise it raises a ValueError. While usually the returned codes are ordered, no particular order is guaranteed.

icd.get_descendants("C00")
#['C000', 'C001', 'C002', 'C003', 'C004', 'C005', 'C006', 'C008', 'C009']

get_ancestors(code)

This function takes a string as input. If the string is a valid ICD-10 code, it returns a list containing all its ancestors in the ICD-10 classification, otherwise it raises a ValueError. The results are ordered from its parent to its most distant ancestor.

icd.get_descendants("H60.1")
#['H60', 'H60-H62', 'VIII']

is_descendant(a,b)

This function takes two strings as input. If both strings are valid ICD-10 codes, it returns True if the first string is a descendant of the second string. If at least one of the strings is not a valid ICD-10 code, it raises a ValueError.

icd.is_descendant("R01.0","XVIII")
#True
icd.is_descendant("M31","K00-K14")
#False

is_ancestor(a,b)

This function takes two strings as input. If both strings are valid ICD-10 codes, it returns True if the first string is an ancestor of the second string. If at least one of the strings is not a valid ICD-10 code, it raises a ValueError.

icd.is_ancestor("XVIII","R01.0")
#True
icd.is_ancestor("K00-K14","M31")
#False

get_nearest_common_ancestor(a,b)

This function takes two strings as input. If both strings are valid ICD-10 codes, it returns the nearest common ancestor if it exists, an empty string if it doesn't exist. If at least one of the strings is not a valid ICD-10 code, it raises a ValueError.

icd.get_nearest_common_ancestor("H28.0","H25.1")
#"H25-H28"
icd.get_nearest_common_ancestor("K35","E21.0")
#""

get_all_codes(keep_dots)

This function takes a boolean for input and returns the list of all items in the ICD-10 classification. If the boolean is True the subcategories in the list will have a dot in them, if it's False the subcategories won't have a dot in them.

icd.get_all_codes(True)
#['I', 'A00-A09', 'A00', 'A00.0', 'A00.1', 'A00.9', 'A01', 'A01.0', ...
icd.get_all_codes(False)
#['I', 'A00-A09', 'A00', 'A000', 'A001', 'A009', 'A01', 'A010', ...

get_index(code)

This function takes a string as input. If the string is a valid ICD-10 code, it returns its index in the list returned by get_all_codes, otherwise it raises a ValueError.

icd.get_index("P00")
#7159
icd.get_all_codes(True)[7159]
#"P00"

disable_memoization()

This function disables memoization and deletes the results that memoization has saved so far. If memoization is already disabled, nothing happens.

icd.disable_memoization()

enable_memoization()

This function enables memoization. Memoization is enabled by default, so you only need this function if it was previously disabled. If memoization is already enabled, nothing happens.

icd.enable_memoization()

reset_memoization()

This function deletes the results that memoization has saved so far. This function is automatically called by disable_memoization.

icd.reset_memoization()

Conclusion

This is everything you needed to know before using the simple_icd_10 library - please contact me if you feel I missed something or there's some passage that you think should be explained better or more. Also contact me if you find any errors in the library or in the documentation.
I hope this library will save you some time; it definitely would have done it for me if I hadn't had to write it!

If you are feeling particularly thankful and/or generous and feel like leaving me a tip, don't!
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If you end up making a donation because of this library, feel free to drop me an email: I'll be happy to read it!

Stefano Travasci