August 07, 2020 -In its Fiscal Year 2021 minibus package passed this week, the House of Representatives once againvotedto remove aprovision that effectivelybans providing federal funds to the Department of Health and Human Services for the development of a national patient identifier.

HHS was initially called on to adopt standards for a distinct, uniquepatient ID, which would be used to identify the medical records of individuals, employers, providers, and healthplans under HIPAA regulations. But in 1998, former Congressman Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas introduced the funding ban, and it has been written into every Congressional budget proposal since 1999.

Advocates for a national patient identifier, such asCHIME, argue that a unique identifier would help toimprovepatient privacy and patient safety, while supportinginteroperability. CHIME and 55 other health groups urged Congress to remove the funding ban or at least adopt a unique patient identifier in August 2019.

In June 2019, Housemembersmade a similar voteto lift the ban, but theSenateopted not to remove thethe funding ban languagein its owndraftfederal appropriations bill. Sen. Rand Paul, MD, R-Kentucky, took it a step further inSeptember2019, moving to remove the national patient identifierlanguagefrom HIPAA altogether.The viewpoint was largely rejected.

But in December,Congressdirected the Office of the National Coordinator to work with private sector stakeholders to develop a national strategy for improving patient identification.

READ MORE: Congress Directs ONC to Support National Patient Identifier Efforts

The latesteffort spearheaded by Reps. Bill Foster, D-Illinois,and Mike Kelly, R-Pennsylvania,was unanimously adopted by the House. Foster argued that the unique patient identifier would help in slowing the spread of COVID-19 and prevent doctor shopping when it comes to opioids, while reducing medical errors and costs.

Removing this archaic ban is more important than ever as we face the COVID-19 pandemic, Foster said in a statement. Our ability to accurately identify patients across the care continuum is critical to addressing this public healthemergency andremoving this ban will alleviate difficult and avoidable operational issues, which will save money and, most importantly, save lives.

HIMSSsignaledsupport of the amendment, launching Patient ID now with other healthcare stakeholders to address patient identification though legislative and regulatory advocacy.

However, the American Civil Liberties Union rejected the effort, citing privacycocnerns.

Absent strong privacy protections, useof unique health identifierscould empower HHS and potentiallyother federal agencies, including law enforcement, to gainunprecedented access to sensitive medical information,ACLUleaders argued.

READ MORE: Would a Unique Patient Identifier Increase the Risk to Patient Privacy?

For thisreason, it is critical that any use of unique health identifiersbesubjectto strict privacy and security protections, which areapproved by Congress and subject to public debate, they added. Historically, we have seen examples of inadequate health privacyregulations, underscoring the importance of requiring Congressionalapproval of health privacy standards in this arena.

The privacy arguments have been previously made by ACLU and other groups. But industrystakeholdersbelieve the risk to privacy is no different than that posed by Social Security numbers, which are tied to a patients financial information. Thus, a national patient identifier is seen as an improvement to privacy.

Use of a national identifier instead of SSN should lessen the burden of security breaches because the ability to steal an identity is limited withoutaSSN, Corinne Smith, a healthcare attorney with Clark Hill Strasburger, toldHealthITSecurity.comamid the Congressional patient ID discussions in 2019. I fail to see how use of the national identifier would pose an increased risk over use ofaSSN.

The ban has prohibited effective conversations,LeslieKrigstein, vice president of Congressional Affairs for CHIME, toldHealthITSecurity.comduring the same timeframe.How can we have a dialogue if were prohibiting HHS from coming to the table with how they would like to identify patients? Or work with private partnerships to move forward on this? Without HHS at the table, were not going to see any change.

The Senate will be the next deciding factor on lifting the HHS funding ban from the appropriations bill, scheduled fornext month.

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House Votes to Lift HHS Funding Ban on National Patient Identifier - HealthITSecurity.com