NYAPRS Note: While other industries have proceeded swiftly into use of new technologies, healthcare is mired in an insecure past. The paper ID cards carried by Medicare members will no longer boast a written social security number, but that fix is a far cry from a secure microprocessed chip that not only contains personal identifying markers but also personal health information. Could public healthcare lead the way in transitioning to this new technology?
Usher in Medicare Smart Cards
The Hill; Neville Pattinson, 5/4/2015
The Medicare reform bill passed this month (“Obama to laud ‘doc fix’ bill in Rose Garden reception,” April 21) included a long overdue fix to Medicare holders’ cards, removing the Social Security number from the front. But there are additional steps we can be taking to modernize Medicare cards and protect the viability of a program that covers approximately 54 million Americans and costs more than $600 billion per year.
A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report examines how the federal government can modernize Medicare by transitioning from paper cards to electronic cards. The report found that smart cards, which contain a microprocessor chip, would allow for “storing and exchanging medical information and conveying beneficiary information,” and would offer “substantially more rigorous authentication of the identities of Medicare beneficiaries and providers than magnetic stripe or bar code cards,” to avoid counterfeiting.
While the current paper Medicare cards that include a SSN expose senior citizens to potential identity theft, a smart card would encode sensitive beneficiary information on a chip that could only be accessed with additional authentication, such as a PIN. The use of smart cards would also support technologies that could reduce expensive Medicare fraud, as well as advance electronic health reporting, and improve the reimbursement process.
Electronically readable cards have been used to access health services in several European countries for decades, and the GAO notes that France and Germany have used smart cards in their healthcare systems since the 1990s. Transitioning to smart card technology would certainly dovetail with ongoing efforts to reform Medicare.
From Neville Pattinson, founding board member of the Secure ID Coalition and SVP of Government Programs for Gemalto North America, Austin, Texas
http://thehill.com/opinion/letters/241014-usher-in-medicare-smart-cards