Permanent Deputy Minister of Health Vu Manh Ha has officially signed an executive directive driving the urgent implementation of Circular No. 06/2026/TT-BYT, which regulates the coding of diseases and causes of death according to the ICD-10 international classification framework. This initiative is designed to streamline clinical management, facilitate health insurance (HI) reimbursements, and advance the medical sector’s digital transformation strategy while safeguarding the legal rights of health insurance participants.
The documented enforcement timelines, administrative task allocations, and clinical infrastructure standards include:
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Statutory Enforcement Timelines: Circular No. 06/2026/TT-BYT was signed into law by the Minister of Health on April 2, 2026, and is scheduled to formally take effect on July 1, 2026. Notably, the specialized provisions enacted under Clause 2 and Clause 3 of Article 5 secured early enforcement beginning June 1, 2026.
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Mandates for Local Health Regulatory Bodies: Provincial and municipal Departments of Health are instructed to directly supervise local medical institutions to ensure timely compliance with Circular 06. These regulatory bodies must strengthen routine audits tracking clinical coding executed by healthcare staff and organize comprehensive professional training workshops to minimize technical documentation errors.
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Operational Standards and Incentive Frameworks for Healthcare Facilities:
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IT Infrastructure Integration: Medical establishments must collaborate directly with their Hospital Information System (HIS) software providers to hardcode the updated ICD-10 classification directories appended to the Circular into digital charting interfaces.
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Clinical Accuracy Enforcement: Facilities must train all healthcare personnel to enhance coding quality, ensuring that disease coding strictly mirrors the primary clinical diagnosis and the real-world physical status of the patient. Depending on operational capacities, institutions are expected to progressively assign dedicated personnel to oversee, guide, and monitor clinical coding compliance internally.
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Specialized Incentive Frameworks: Aligned with central decrees from the Party and Government focusing on digital transformation and breakthrough scientific development, the Ministry of Health directs healthcare facilities to prioritize and establish robust compensation packages and attraction policies for specialized clinical coding professionals.
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Technical Technical Requirements for Vietnam Social Security:
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Data Gateway Integration: The Ministry of Health requests Vietnam Social Security (VSS) under the Ministry of Finance to promptly integrate the complete ICD-10 disease code directories onto the data intake gateway of the Health Insurance Assessment Information System to ensure uninterrupted operations on the enforcement date.
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Electronic Assessment Optimization: When executing technical audits on the digital assessment system, VSS must establish and adjust assessment algorithms to enable flexible, interconnected cross-field information linking. This framework will serve to comprehensively evaluate the clinical appropriateness of medical indications (laboratory tests, pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and technical services) without generating administrative bottlenecks.
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