ICD-9 Code 655.40

Suspected damage to fetus from other disease in the mother, affecting management of mother, unspecified as to episode of care or not applicable

Not Valid for Submission

655.40 is a legacy non-billable code used to specify a medical diagnosis of suspected damage to fetus from other disease in the mother, affecting management of mother, unspecified as to episode of care or not applicable. This code was replaced on September 30, 2015 by its ICD-10 equivalent.

ICD-9: 655.40
Short Description:Fet damg d/t dis-unspec
Long Description:Suspected damage to fetus from other disease in the mother, affecting management of mother, unspecified as to episode of care or not applicable

Convert 655.40 to ICD-10

The following crosswalk between ICD-9 to ICD-10 is based based on the General Equivalence Mappings (GEMS) information:

  • O35.4XX0 - Maternal care for damage to fetus from alcohol, unsp

Code Classification

  • Complications of pregnancy, childbirth, and the puerperium (630–679)
    • Normal delivery, and other indications for care in pregnancy, labor, and delivery (650-659)
      • 655 Known or suspected fetal abnormality affecting management of mother

Information for Medical Professionals

Code Edits

The Medicare Code Editor (MCE) detects and reports errors in the coding of claims data. The following ICD-9 Code Edits are applicable to this code:

Information for Patients


Infections and Pregnancy

During pregnancy, some common infections like the common cold or a skin infection do not usually cause serious problems. But other infections can be dangerous to you, your baby, or both. Some infections may lead to preterm birth and low birth weight babies. Others can cause serious illness, birth defects, and lifelong disabilities, such as hearing loss or learning problems.

Some of the infections that can be dangerous during pregnancy include:

  • Bacterial vaginosis (BV)
  • Group B strep (GBS)
  • Hepatitis
  • Sexually transmitted diseases
  • Toxoplasmosis
  • Urinary tract infections
  • Yeast infections
  • Zika virus

To try to prevent infections,:

  • Don't eat raw or undercooked meat
  • Don't share food or drinks with other people
  • Wash your hands frequently
  • Don't empty cat litter. Cats can transmit toxoplasmosis.

If you do get an infection during pregnancy, contact your health care provider about how best to protect you and your baby. Only some medicines are safe during pregnancy.


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ICD-9 Footnotes

General Equivalence Map Definitions
The ICD-9 and ICD-10 GEMs are used to facilitate linking between the diagnosis codes in ICD-9-CM and the new ICD-10-CM code set. The GEMs are the raw material from which providers, health information vendors and payers can derive specific applied mappings to meet their needs.

  • Approximate Flag - The approximate flag is on, indicating that the relationship between the code in the source system and the code in the target system is an approximate equivalent.
  • No Map Flag - The no map flag indicates that a code in the source system is not linked to any code in the target system.
  • Combination Flag - The combination flag indicates that more than one code in the target system is required to satisfy the full equivalent meaning of a code in the source system.