Are All-Patient Refined Diagnosis-Related Groups (APR-DRGs) the same as Diagnosis-Related Groups (DRGs)?
Although both APR-DRGs and DRGs are based on a patients International Classification of Diseases, Ninth Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-9-CM) diagnostic and procedure codes, they are different patient classification schemes. The 3M Corporation developed and sells a widely used software product to define risk adjustment categories called APR-DRGs, which has the advantage of subclass groupings for Severity of Illness and Risk of Mortality. DRGs are designated by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and software groupers are available from various vendors to assign DRGs.
