biometric patient identification in healthcare

Our Top Five Biometric Patient Identification Blog Posts of 2015

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biometric patient identification in healthcare

2015 was an important year of growth and innovation for RightPatient®. We started this blog two years ago to help educate the healthcare community on the importance of establishing secure, accurate patient identification in healthcare and to establish a trusted resource to help understand how the use of biometrics for patient ID has proven to be an important tool to help increase patient safety, eliminate duplicate medical records, improve revenue cycle management, and prevent medical identity theft and fraud. 

biometric patient identification in healthcare

Read through some of our most popular blog posts on biometric patient identification in healthcare during 2015

Throughout our journey, we have shared many important posts demonstrating how our hospital partners have successfully implemented biometrics for patient identification and provided real life examples of the post deployment benefits realized. Among the dozens of posts the RightPatient® team posted during 2015, the following posts were the most popular:

  1. Uniting Accurate Patient Identification with Secure Single Sign-On (SSO) to Improve Data Integrity in Healthcare: In an effort to help continue increasing patient data integrity in healthcare, we announced a new partnership with Healthcast,  the #1 ranked single sign-on solution (KLAS, 2014) to increase patient safety and secure access to patient data. 
  2. RightPatient® Prevents Healthcare Fraud at University Health System: Healthcare fraud and medical identity theft are two rising concerns for healthcare organizations because they jeopardize patient safety, raise the cost of care, and could lead to non-reimbursable medical procedures. University Hospital in Augusta, GA recently was able to prevent healthcare fraud in their ER through the use of the RightPatient® with photo biometrics.
  3. Removing the Word “Scan” from Iris Recognition for Healthcare Biometrics: Fueled by Hollywood sensationalism, iris recognition biometric identification is often depicted as “scanning” a person’s eyes with visible light. The fact is, no visible light is used with iris recognition and instead of a “scan,” iris biometrics takes a high resolution digital photograph. 
  4. Identify Unconscious, Unknown Patients with Biometric Identification Technology: The difficulty to identify an unconscious or disoriented patient jeopardizes patient safety in healthcare. Biometric patient identification has emerged as a technology capable of identifying patients in these conditions, but did you know that not all biometric patient ID solutions have the ability to identify unconscious or disoriented patients? 
  5. Biometric Patient Identification Implementation Should Be Higher On The Priority List: Despite the fact that accurate patient identification affects so many downstream clinical and financial activities, hospitals and healthcare organizations are still not placing enough emphasis on evaluating implementation and use of this technology as a priority. 

We will continue to research and write educational and informational posts during 2016 about the rising use of biometrics for patient identification in healthcare including case studies and examples of how our technology is helping hospitals around the world to: eliminate duplicate medical records, prevent medical identity theft and fraud, increase patient data integrity, and improve patient safety. 2015 was a year of significant growth for RightPatient® as we continue working toward our mission to offer the most innovative and comprehensive patient identification solution that increases patient safety, reduces costs, improves the quality of care, and enhances the patient experience. 

Curious to know more about the use of biometric patient identification in healthcare? Is there a topic that you would like to learn more about? Drop us a message at: jtrader@rightpatient.com with your ideas and suggestions!

Thank you for being a part of our blog community!

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Patient Identification in Healthcare: The Year in Review

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2015 was another breakout year for the healthcare industry. From the transition to ICD-10 to advancements (or lack thereof) in interoperability to the expanding role of big data, 2015 demonstrated that healthcare continues to be in the throes of a major transition spearheaded by rapid digitization of the industry. While the jury is still out on exactly what type of lasting impact the events of 2015 will have, one area that stands out is the increased attention of establishing accurate patient identification.

There are simply too many downstream activities affected by accurate patient identification in healthcare to continue pushing the issue to the back burner of priorities, so we were quite pleased that 2015 seemed to be the year where the topic of accurate patient ID is finally getting the attention it deserves at the front of the line.

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Did accurate patient identification in healthcare receive more attention in 2015?

Here is a recap of notable and influential patient identification news and events that we identified as the most impactful in 2015:

#1 – CHIME flexes its clout. Big time.

  • The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) issues national patient ID challenge: Few things get people excited about an initiative than monetary incentives. In March of 2015, CHIME issued a challenge to help discover the most innovative solution to patient matching. The incentive? 

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Our take: CHIME’s national patient ID challenge is flat out smart. Dangling the financial carrot to the healthcare industry will surely spur innovative approaches to solving this issue and motivate health IT vendors to step up and address the challenge. Wholeheartedly backed by a coalition of influential organizations and individuals in healthcare, the challenge is poised to foster creative approaches to solving this dangerous and festering problem in healthcare.  

“We must first acknowledge that the lack of a consistent patient identification strategy is the most significant challenge inhibiting the safe and secure electronic exchange of health information. As our healthcare system begins to realize the innately transformational capabilities of health IT, moving toward nationwide health information exchange, this essential core functionality – consistency in accurately identifying patients – must be addressed. As data exchange increases among providers, patient data matching errors and mismatches will become exponentially more dangerous and costly.” (CHIME’s letter to Congress, May 7, 2014 http://bit.ly/1NVNvzk)

Our take: CHIME’s letter to Congress could be a watershed moment to finally push accurate patient identification into the forefront of priorities for the healthcare industry. Since CHIME is a very influential organization that Captiol Hill pays attention to, their public push to move forward on finding a viable solution to accurate patient identification in healthcare could prove to be the tipping point to solve this serious issue. In addition, at a Congressional hearing in June, CHIME publicly stated in a hearing convened by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) that advancing accurate patient identification in healthcare will, “radically reduce medical errors and save lives.”

#2 – AHIMA adds their voice and influence to push for a patient identification solution

Our take: As more well established and influential healthcare organizations lend their voices to solving the patient identification issue, the odds of discovering a solution will precipitously increase. Long viewed as a conscientious problem with too many complexities to solve, many healthcare professionals are finally coming to the conclusion that patient identification in healthcare is a single catalyst that directly influences the success or failure of many other initiatives in the industry: interoperability, health information exchange, and mHealth to name a few. We are pleased that AHIMA is more openly wielding its impact as a respected and trusted organization on such a critical issue in healthcare.

#3 – FHIR is great, but will interoperability never work without a national identifier

“There’s people out there who think that with FHIR we’ve solved all the problems. We haven’t, because we’re not authorized to solve lots of the problems” (Graham Grieve on frustrations of the moratorium Congress enacted to block funding research on a national patient identifier: http://bit.ly/1O3HbGK) 

Our take: Without sounding like a broken record or belaboring the point, for quite some time we have voiced concerns about advancing interoperability in healthcare without first addressing the need to establish accurate patient identification.  When you hear a quote like the one from Graham Grieve above from someone battling on the front lines of interoperability, it lends even more credence to the argument that it seems rather pointless and futile to continuing spending millions to advance interoperability in healthcare without having the ability to accurately identify patients in disparate health systems.

#4 – Biometric patient identification deployments continue to rise

  • More on this topic in next week’s post, but 2015 was a banner year for biometrics in healthcare. From single sign-on to access control to accurate patient identification, we observed a rapid increase in the deployment of biometrics at hospitals across the globe. Research firm Tractica forecasts that the nascent global healthcare biometrics market revenue will hit $3.5 billion in revenues by 2024, foreshadowing the tremendous potential of this technology and making it one of the most promising opportunities for the biometric industry.

What’s your take on the year on patient identification in healthcare? What moments or events stand out to you? Leave us a note in the comments section!

Next week: RightPatient® – The Year in Review — a short post of our major accomplishments during 2015. Stay tuned!

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RightPatient® Prevents Healthcare Fraud at University Health System

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Healthcare Fraud Jeopardizes Patient Safety and Raises the Cost of Care
Emergency Departments (ED) can be subjected to healthcare fraud from individuals without insurance seeking care, especially those with manageable chronic conditions. These patients often go to hospital EDs because they don’t have access to any source of care and in a large number of cases, attempt to defraud the healthcare system by providing different names, dates of birth, or other demographic information during registration.

Hospital patient access staff on alert for healthcare fraud often must strike a tricky balance of ensuring a patient receives timely care with the need to identify and prevent these individuals from illegally obtaining medical services that could raise liability and possibly harm the patient.

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Through the use of photo biometrics, the University Health System was able to catch a patient attempting to commit healthcare fraud in the ED.

Patients who may be trying to defraud the system can raise the cost of care for all of us with most of the cost to treat these individuals passed on to insurance providers that raise premiums to subsidize care provided to the uninsured. It’s a persistent problem in healthcare that jeopardizes patient safety.

Medical Identity Theft and Healthcare Fraud are Persistent Patient Safety Problems in Healthcare
The National Health Care Anti-Fraud Association (NHCAA) estimates that the financial losses due to health care fraud are in the tens of billions of dollars each year. The Ponemon Institute released a study earlier this year that reported a 21.7% increase in medical identity theft cases since the previous year’s study.

A costly and often complex and time consuming issue to resolve, healthcare fraud and medical identity theft often financially decimate victims and healthcare institutions and can have a ripple effect that negatively impacts provider reputation. Add to that evolving patient expectations that healthcare providers are taking the necessary steps to protect their identities and ensure the privacy of their protected health information (PHI), and it’s clear that this is a festering problem in the industry that deserves immediate and swift preventative action.

Implementing Biometric Patient Identification to Identify Potential Healthcare Fraud

When University Health System staff sat down to address the problem of healthcare fraud and began to assess patient authentication technology options that had the potential to prevent it, they decided to deploy RightPatient® biometric patient identification as part of an overall strategy to increase patient safety, eliminate duplicate medical records, and prevent medical identity theft and fraud throughout their network. Using photo biometrics as their preferred modality, University launched the RightPatient® patient identification system in the summer of 2015 at both hospitals in their network and began registering patients and linking their unique biometric credentials to a single electronic health record (EHR).

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Through the use of photo biometrics, the University Health System was able to catch a patient attempting to commit healthcare fraud in the ED.

Thusfar, the deployment has been a resounding success, with over 99% of patients opting in to ensure the safety and privacy of their PHI. University placed a great deal of emphasis to ensure their staff understood why the RightPatient® solution was implemented and meticulously trained patient access personnel on how to properly use the system prior to launch.

Their efforts paid off.

Recently, a patient was registered through the ED in the RightPatient® system, and then returned to the same ED days later claiming a different date of birth and a different last name. Following hospital registration protocol, the patient access representative took the patient’s photo with an iris camera and the RightPatient® system immediately flagged the patient’s medical record and instantly notified staff that the patient had previously enrolled with their biometric credentials already linked to another unique EHR. University staff then realized that the patient was attempting to assume another identity and took action to prevent it.

Even if this patient had enrolled in the RightPatient® biometric patient identification system at another location within University’s network, they still would have been flagged as a potential fraud case if they returned to a different facility due to the fact that RightPatient® seamlessly integrated with University’s Epic EHR system and can be used at any point along the care continuum, regardless of the patient’s physical location within the network (RightPatient® can even be used to authenticate an identity on patient portals and mHealth applications!).

Conclusion

The persistent and dangerous problem of medical identity theft and healthcare fraud is a direct threat to patient safety but also has repercussions that impact many other facets of care delivery. Implementing modern patient identification technologies that have the unique ability to prevent healthcare fraud should be a key goal for any medical facility set on improving safety, lowering liability, and raising the quality of care. The University Health System case clearly demonstrates that RightPatient® deters medical identity theft and healthcare fraud throughout the care continuum by linking a patient’s unique biometric credentials to one medical record.

Thank you to the staff at University for allowing us to share this story with our community!

 

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RightPatient® Helps Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital Fight Healthcare Fraud

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Prescription Drug Abuse

Eliminating fraud is a pressing issue in healthcare that continues to threaten patient safety. The FBI states on their Web site: “With no signs of slowing down, healthcare fraud is a rising threat, with national health care expenditures estimated to exceed $3 trillion in 2014 and spending continuing to outpace inflation.” On average, healthcare fraud accounts for 10% of our nation’s annual healthcare expenditure.

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Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital recently used photo biometrics to prevent healthcare fraud.

One form of healthcare fraud seen in emergency departments at hospitals around the country is individuals attempting to commit identity theft in order to obtain prescription medication. With approximately 8.76 million people in the U.S. abusing prescription medication and the lion’s share of those medications coming from a doctor’s prescription, medical facilities are proactively stepping up their efforts to implement stronger patient identification safeguards to ensure that the problem is addressed. After all, many patients may not understand the health dangers and risks of someone stealing your identity and inaccurate health data being attributed to your medical record – it is extremely dangerous and could result in serious injury, even death should a clinician act on incorrect protected health data (PHI) in your medical record. 

Just how bad is the problem of prescription drug abuse in the U.S.? Consider the fact that every day in the United States, 44 people die as a result of prescription opioid overdose. Fortunately, there are tools available to catch identity fraud at the point-of-service in hospitals before harm is done.

Using Photo Biometrics to Deter Healthcare Fraud

Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital implemented the RightPatient® patient identity management solutionusing photo biometrics to help support patient safety, eliminate duplicate medical records, and prevent and deter medical identity theft. Recently, a patient arrived at the Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital emergency room seeking treatment for an injury that according to the patient had just occurred in the prior hour. The patient signed in under a fraudulent name, date of birth, address, invalid marital status, a disconnected phone number, invalid employment status, fraudulent emergency contact, and an invalid social security number. The patient proceeded with registration, and signed all admission paperwork under the fraudulent information.

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Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital recently used photo biometrics to prevent healthcare fraud.

During the registration process, the registration clerk used the RightPatient® photo biometrics solution to enroll the patient since this was (according the patient) the first time they had ever been to the hospital. The RightPatient® system worked just as it was designed, sending the registration clerk an alert that indicated the patent had been previously enrolled and that their biometric credentials had already been linked to another unique electronic medical record, providing the medical record number the patient had been registered under.

The clerk was then able to access the medical record the patient had been previously registered under and after review, Hugh Chatham was able to see other visits for that same day in other clinic/practice locations. A decision was made to contact local authorities.

Thanks to the RightPatient® software and the efforts of this staff member, Hugh Chatham Memorial Hospital was able to securely identify the patient, avoid duplicate medical records, prevent identity theft and associated healthcare costs, and help maintain a safe environment for patients. 

Conclusion

Encouraging healthcare facilities to implement safeguards that ensure accurate patient authentication through technologies such as photo biometrics has been our mission since we founded RightPatient®. We will continue to share our success stories with others to help educate and inform in the overall effort to remove fraud and increase patient safety in healthcare.

Have a story on how the use of biometrics prevented a potential case of healthcare fraud? Please share it with us in the comments!

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Bethesda Health Implements Iris Biometrics for Patient Identification

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Excited to announce that another hospital system has implemented our biometric patient identification solution using iris biometrics to help raise patient safety standards, safeguard patients from medical identity theft and fraud at the point of service, and prevent the creation of duplicate medical records.

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Bethesda Health becomes the latest hospital system to implement the RightPatient® biometric patient identification solution using iris recognition.

After carefully evaluating several biometric patient identification solutions, Bethesda Health chose to deploy iris biometrics due to it’s non-contact, hygienic form factor which supports hospital infection control initiatives plus, implementation of RightPatient® poises Bethesda Health to eventually extend the use of the technology to any patient touchpoint along the care continuum that requires patient identification accuracy to ensure optimal outcomes. This is critical foresight by Bethesda staff who recognized that accurate patient identification in the new healthcare paradigm extends far beyond in or outpatient registration within their facilities and should now be addressed holistically by providing secure and accurate patient ID at any point along the care continuum where patients have access to medical care or sensitive personal health information (e.g. patient portals, mHealth apps, home health, etc.).

We welcome Bethesda Health as a trusted partner in the effort to increase patient safety, reduce duplicate medical record rates, eliminate medical identity theft, improve revenue cycle efficiency through the use of our biometric patient identification platform using iris recognition. 

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For more information on the deployment, please visit the news release section of our Web site. 

Learn more about the advantages of using biometrics for patient identification by visiting the Resources section of our Web site.

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#HITsm Tweetchat Highlights Progress, Obstacles for Patient Identification in Healthcare

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accurate patient identification in healthcare discussed during 09/11/15 #HITs,m tweet chat
#HITsm Tweetchat Highlights Progress, Obstacles for Patient Identification in Healthcare

Healthcare professionals from around the world discussed the dilemma of achieving accurate patient identification in healthcare during the 09.11.15 #HITsm tweetchat. (Photo courtesy of HL7 Standards)

We had the honor of hosting the weekly #HITsm Twitterchat this past Friday centered on the topic of patient identification in healthcare. For those not aware of the #HITsm weekly chat, the HL7 Standards Web site deftly describes it as:

“…#HITsm is an acronym for “healthcare IT social media” and we focus on current topics that are influencing healthcare technology, health IT, and the use of social media in healthcare.” (courtesy of: http://www.hl7standards.com/hitsm-chat/)

The chat demographic spans a wide range of healthcare professionals — vendors, doctors, patients, industry experts, and even national professional healthcare organizations — all coalescing for one hour each week to discuss a wide range of topics related to health IT. 

Considering the importance of establishing accurate patient identification in healthcare and it’s ripple effect to many other aspects of care delivery, interoperability, accountability, and improving individual and population health, we selected this as a topic for the weekly discussion. Included in the discussion was an evaluation and assessment of the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives’ (CHIME) national patient identity challenge to determine if it will actually produce a solution that will eradicate the burdens of matching patient data and bring us closer to establishing higher data integrity, reducing medical errors, and improving care.

Topics for the chat included:

1. Establishing a national patient identifier continues to be a hot debate – will it ever materialize? Are there tangible benefits to a national patient identifier?
2. Will @CIOCHIME’s national patient ID challenge eradicate the burdens of matching patient data and bring us closer to establishing higher data integrity, reducing medical errors, and improving care?
3. Will true healthcare interoperability ever be realized in the absence of fixing the problem of inaccurate patientID?
4. Do patients now have an inherently larger role to ensure the accuracy of their medical records?
5. Does the explosion of mobile devices, telehealth, & mhealth tools raise the urgency level for healthcare providers to implement stronger patient ID technology?
6. What new patient identification technologies show promise to help improve patient matching and interoperability?

Responses, comments, and opinions to these topics were insightful and intelligent. Here is a list of select responses and feedback to some of the topics:

Topic 1: Establishing a national patient identifier continues to be a hot debate – will it ever materialize? Are there tangible benefits to a national patient identifier?

Topic 2: Will @CIOCHIME’s national patient ID challenge eradicate the burdens of matching patient data and bring us closer to establishing higher data integrity, reducing medical errors, and improving care?

Topic 3: Will true healthcare #interoperability ever be realized in the absence of fixing the problem of inaccurate #patientID?

Topic 4: Do patients now have an inherently larger role to ensure the accuracy of their medical records?

Topic 5: Does the explosion of mobile devices, telehealth, & mhealth tools raise the urgency level for healthcare providers to implement stronger patient ID technology?

          T5: Again, use case specific. Many of the use cases today won’t benefit from national pat id… BUT… not say to they won’t #HITsm

Topic 6: What new patient identification technologies show promise to help improve patient matching and interoperability?

           #HITsm T6 In healthcare, I would expect less fraud w biometric ID’s. Solves unconscious patient problem and the form time problem. #HITsm

A copy of the complete chat transcript can be found here.

As you can see from the selected tweets, the topic of achieving accurate patient identification in healthcare is not easy especially in the context of identifying a solution that can be used as a universal credential. We were pleased that the #HITsm tweet chat participants provided pragmatic, intelligent comments and insight to our questions demonstrating their keen ability to identify the root causes of achieving a national patient identifier and their tacit support for CHIME’s contest and prowess to thrust this complex issue into the national spotlight.

Our thanks to @OchoTex and @michenoteboom for providing us the opportunity to host their weekly #HITsm chat on patient identification in healthcare and for all of the healthcare professionals who participated!

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RightPatient® to Host September 11th #HITsm Chat on Patient Identification in Healthcare

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tweet chat on patient identification in healthcare

Join us this Friday from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. CST as we host the weekly #HITsm tweet chat and discuss the conundrum of establishing accurate patient identification in healthcare. The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) recently issued a $1 million “national patient ID challenge” in an effort to find a universal solution for accurately matching patients with their health information. 

tweet chat on patient identification in healthcare

Join us on Friday, September the 11th for the #HITsm tweet chat where we will discuss CHIME’s national patient identifier challenge and the state of patient identification in healthcare.

Patient identification in healthcare has bubbled to the top of the health IT priority list since accurately identifying patients is perhaps the most fundamental element of ensuring data accuracy throughout the care continuum but a confluence of barriers has inhibited advancing initiatives intended to improve it and help increase patient safety. 

During the chat we will discuss CHIME’s initiative and debate on whether it truly has the ability to improve patient identification in healthcare plus we will talk in-depth about how inaccurate patient ID effects healthcare interoperability, the evolving patient role to ensure the accuracy of their PHI, new patient touchpoints that complicate the goal of implementing technology that improves identification accuracy, and which new patient identification technologies show promise to help advance accurate patient identification in healthcare.

Please join the discussion beginning Friday at 11 a.m. CST, 12 p.m. EDT by following the #HITsm hashtag.

Additional information about the topic and discussion can be found here.

What additional topics would you like to see added to the conversation on establishing accurate patient identification in healthcare?

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Novant Health Uses Iris Biometrics to Identify Unknown Patient

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It’s a familiar case. An unconscious or unknown patient arrives in the ER without any identification leaving clinicians to administer care in the absence of any medical history to review. This presents a serious patient safety risk since treating an unknown patient without the benefit of securing their identity is dangerous and can be a huge liability. What if they are allergic to a certain medication? What if they have a pre-existing condition that must be considered prior to receiving any treatment?

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Novant Health recently used the RightPatient iris biometrics patient identification system to identify an unknown, disoriented patient.

Since these cases are more often trauma related requiring immediate attention, clinicians must take a risk and administer care in the absence of any historical medical data. An obvious threat to patient safety and a situation that clearly raises liability, healthcare organizations have long sought to adopt technology that can instantly identify patients in these cases without the need for any demographic information. 

The staff at Novant Health decided to proactively implement an iris biometric identification system throughout their network as a means to secure accurate patient ID and ensure that patients, no matter what the circumstances, are kept safe throughout the care continuum. Although adopting a biometric patient identification system to identify unconscious or unknown patients wasn’t the sole reason that Novant implemented this technology, they knew that by choosing to use iris recognition as their primary biometric modality they would be able to quickly and accurately identify any patient in these circumstances without having to ask for an additional identification credentials (e.g. – D.O.B.). 

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Novant’s iris biometric patient identification system was recently put to the test when a disoriented, unknown patient arrived in the ER without any identification credentials. Novant staff quickly realized that they could take the patient’s photo with a RightPatient iris camera and if they had been previously registered in their Epic EHR database, the biometric patient identification system would recognize them and immediately pull up their medical record. Fortunately, the patient had previously been enrolled with the RightPatient system and their identity was instantly recognized after their photo was taken with the iris camera. A big relief to Novant staff since they were now able to not only access her medical history prior to treatment, but they were also able to quickly contact the patient’s relatives to inform them of the situation.

Thank you to our partners at Novant Health for sharing this story and demonstrating the value of using biometrics for patient identification in the context of keeping patients as safe as possible throughout the care continuum!

How often do you experience situations where patients arrive at your facility without identification credentials? Did you know that not all biometric patient identification solutions have the ability to identify unknown or unconscious patients?

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Iris Recognition Offers Non-Contact, Hygienic Individual Identification

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The following guest post was written by Brian Bilia, Enterprise Sales Consultant with RightPatient®

More Schools Using Non-Contact Biometrics for Individual Identification

In case you missed it, this week Virginia Commonwealth University announced the implementation of iris recognition in their on-campus dining halls for student identification. In addition to presenting a safer and more secure way to identify students the deployment according to the article, the initiative is designed to be:

“…helpful for students who forget or lose their IDs over the weekend, as there is not a way to get a replacement card over the weekend.” (USA Today, “New iris cameras at Va. school scan students’ eyes for entry into dining hall” http://usat.ly/1L4cbWb)

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If schools adopt iris biometrics for student ID based on it’s non-contact, hygienic form factor, shouldn’t the healthcare industry offer the same protection to patients?

The article goes on to report that one of the main reasons Virginia Commonwealth and another schools chose to deploy iris recognition was because of its non-contact, hygienic feature:

“VCU is following in the steps of other schools — including George Mason University — which introduced the eye scanning system last year. Both schools opted for the this non-contact form of biometric technology — as opposed to a fingerprint scanner — because it is less invasive and won’t spread germs.” (USA Today, “New iris cameras at Va. school scan students’ eyes for entry into dining hall” http://usat.ly/1L4cbWb)

Essentially, hygiene played a critical role in determining which biometric modality the school would use for student identification. Due to the fact that iris recognition does not require physical contact with a biometric device, it presents one of the most hygienic hardware options available, keeping end users safe from the spread of germs and illness that could otherwise be a risk when using a contact dependent modality such as fingerprint or palm vein recognition. The fact that schools continue to adopt iris recognition for identification due to it’s hygienic, non-contact features begs the question — shouldn’t hospitals adopting biometric patient identification tools be investigating non-contact biometric modalities too?

Non-Contact, Hygienic Biometric Patient ID in Healthcare

In the healthcare industry, patient safety is the #1 priority. Rising conscientiousness about new strategies to keep patients safe rise combined with the explosion of digital health tools has pushed hospitals to re-assess hospital acquired condition (HAC) control policies and implement new platforms and monitoring programs that provide a safer and more hygienic environment for patient care. In addition, new policies by Medicare now penalize hospitals with high HAC rates raising the level of urgency to adopt digital health tools that support hospital infection control policies.

In lockstep with the urgency to increase patient safety in any possible way, hospitals and healthcare organizations are quickly catching on to the benefits of using biometrics for patient identification as a means to increase patient safety but what they are also discovering is that not all biometric hardware modalities have the ability to offer a non-contact, hygienic experience. Biometric hardware that requires physical contact by a patient can be interpreted as non-hygienic and raises the risk of HAC’s if the device is not properly sanitized after each use. Even when properly sanitized, these devices still pose a threat to patient safety due to the fact that cleaning agents do not have the ability to remove 100% of germs or bacteria.

Upon further research, healthcare entities learn that using iris recognition for patient identification in healthcare offers the use of an iris camera that a patient does not touch, helping to support hospital infection control policies and ensure that no one is susceptible to germs or bacteria that could cause an infection or illness. 

Patient Acceptance is Key

Despite the advantages of using iris recognition for patient ID in healthcare, certain stigmas exist about this technology that may make a healthcare organization hesitant to adopt. Many feel that iris recognition is too invasive and beams visible light into a patient’s eyes to determine their identity. In reality, iris recognition is often confused with retinal scanning which does use visible light for identification. Iris recognition instead uses camera technology with subtle infrared illumination to acquire images of the detail-rich, intricate structures of the iris. It’s 100% safe, and our field research has proven that patients are overwhelmingly accepting of using iris recognition for identification when presented with the option to protect them from duplicate medical records, fraud, and medical ID theft. 

Plus, iris recognition for patient ID offers other benefits such as the ability to identify unconscious or unknown patients and is built on one-to-many matching, the only true way to prevent duplicate medical records and medical identity theft in healthcare. 

Conclusion

Iris recognition has proven to be one of the most popular biometric modalities for individual identification for a number of reasons, including it’s non-contact, hygienic form factor that protects end users from germs and bacteria that otherwise exist on alternative biometric hardware devices. Hygiene has a rising influence in determining which hardware modality is utilized in  biometric identification management projects, and the advantages of using iris recognition biometrics has positioned the technology for strong adoption growth in the years to come.

How important is hygiene to you when selecting a biometric hardware modality?

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Brian joined RightPatient in July 2015 as Enterprise Sales Consultant for the Midwest Region. Prior to RightPatient, Brian held several roles in sales management and new business development achieving over 15 years of experience working with the healthcare/hospital industry. 

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UCLA Breach Reinforces Importance to Protect Patient PHI

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It’s probably unfair to say that the recent UCLA Medical Center data breach that potentially exposed the personal health information (PHI) of 4.5 million patients was a wake up call for the healthcare industry to implement tighter data security protocols. In fact, it wasn’t a wake up call at all.

Healthcare data breaches have proliferated over the last five plus years, and the Health and Human Services (HHS) public “wall of shame” list of healthcare data breaches involving 500 or more individuals is…well….let’s just say a tad crowded. Since HHS began the list in 2009, 1,265 breaches exposing the records of nearly 135 million people have made the list. Ouch. The UCLA data breach isn’t groundbreaking news, it is simply another chapter in the long novel of healthcare data breaches that have placed millions of patients at risk by exposing their PHI and in some cases, social security numbers and personal demographic information. 

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The recent UCLA data breach is a strong reminder that healthcare organizations should consider the use of biometrics such as facial or voice recognition to protect patient PHI on mobile devices and patient portals.

The UCLA breach also foreshadows rising demand for tighter security protocols to protect PHI from unauthorized access on patient portals, mobile devices, and other new touchpoints. This rise of additional patient touchpoints to access PHI has vaulted establishing tighter security controls into the spotlight beyond traditional means of authentication. History has shown that username/password-based security is inadequate on mobile devices, yet healthcare organizations continue to adopt technology that uses this method to authenticate patients. Considering the high stakes to protect patient PHI, the UCLA data breach wasn’t a wake up call – it moved the needle to protect patient PHI to Defcon 1. 

The HIPAA Privacy Rule mandates that healthcare organizations secure remote access to PHI data as a safeguard for patient privacy and to eliminate data breaches that can lead to fraud and medical identity theft. The introduction of touchpoints such as patient portals and mobile devices changes the dynamic of protecting patient PHI because it demands adopting strategies that include using modern patient identification systems yet many healthcare organizations continue to rely on antiquated security solutions.  

Healthcare organizations must now consider patient identification systems that can address accurate authentication at each and every touchpoint along the care continuum, far beyond simply implementing technology that covers patient ID at office visits. 

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Implementing accurate patient identification when accessing PHI from mobile devices and patient portals must balance strong security with convenience and speed, which is why technologies such as facial and voice biometrics are gaining popularity. The use of biometrics to protect patient PHI is a smart investment, especially if healthcare organizations deploy a solution that offers the flexibility to be used during hospital/office visits and on each and every touchpoint a patient now has the ability to utilize as a means to access health data. Biometric patient identification solutions offer stronger security than user names and passwords and have proven to be more efficient and convenient by eliminating the need and frustration to remember multiple login credentials.

As we experience a sharp rise in patient driven interactions within the healthcare system that offer more avenues for criminals and hackers to access PHI, it is critical that healthcare organizations implement modern identification solutions that have the ability to better protect this information. Biometrics to protect patient PHI is quickly gaining attention as a security solution that can serve this need. Although it’s impossible to determine whether or not biometrics could have helped prevent hackers from obtaining access to protected patient PHI in the UCLA data breach, the use of this technology can help to offer a secure layer of protection that can deter hackers from even attempting to try.