Document ID: chunk:federal_register_of_legislation:F2022L00277:reg:7
Version: federal_register_of_legislation:F2022L00277
Segment Type: reg
Provision Reference: reg 7
Character Range: 1635–3811

7               Kind of injury, disease or death to which this Statement of Principles relates
(1)          This Statement of Principles is about heart block and death from heart block.
Meaning of heart block
(2)          For the purposes of this Statement of Principles, heart block:
(a)          means a cardiac disorder in which there is a delay or interruption to the conduction of electrical impulse from the atria to the ventricles through the atrioventricular node, bundle of His or the bundle branches due to an anatomical or functional impairment in the conduction system; and
(b)          includes atrioventricular block and bundle branch block; and
(c)          excludes congenital heart block, long QT syndrome and transient physiological heart block.
             Note 1: Heart block includes right and left bundle branch block, bifascicular and trifascicular block, and first, second and third degree atrioventricular block.
             Note 2: Second degree heart block includes Mobitz type I (Wenckebach) and Mobitz type II atrioventricular block.
             Note 3: Heart block may be asymptomatic in some cases. Symptoms of heart block typically include fatigue, shortness of breath or chest pain on exertion, dizziness and fainting (syncope).
(3)          While heart block attracts ICD‑10‑AM code I44, I45.0, I45.1, I45.2, I45.3, I45.4 or I45.9, in applying this Statement of Principles the meaning of heart block is that given in subsection (2).
(4)          For subsection (3), a reference to an ICD-10-AM code is a reference to the code assigned to a particular kind of injury or disease in The International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems, Tenth Revision, Australian Modification (ICD-10-AM), Tenth Edition, effective date of 1 July 2017, copyrighted by the Independent Hospital Pricing Authority, ISBN 978-1-76007-296-4.
Death from heart block
(5)          For the purposes of this Statement of Principles, heart block, in relation to a person, includes death from a terminal event or condition that was contributed to by the person's heart block.
Note: terminal event is defined in the Schedule 1 - Dictionary.