The Healthcare sector is the most sensitive among all of the others because it stores information about patients and their treatments. If they don’t place barriers in criminals’ way, the chances of breaching, illegal benefits attainment, and other frauds will increase. Furthermore, the healthcare sector is reliant on various subsidiaries like pharmacies, insurers, surgeons, doctors, paramedical staff, and laboratories. How can the sector make sure the person arriving in the center is the legit patient?
As per stats by HIPAAJournal, there were 1,531,855 false data beaches as of February 2020. To cure this and the rest of the other issues, Know Your Patients’ (KYP) solutions come with easy-to-follow and authentic processes. A catch-all phrase, Know Your Patients quadrate with Know Your Customer (KYC) regulations. Patient verification provides due diligence while minimizing data breaches and fake-identity treatments.
How Does the Patient Identity Verification Process Work?
The process is quick, easy, and user-friendly. When customers travel abroad or register online for banking, they are required to upload identity documents. Similar to this, KYP requires case history alongside original identity documents. This way the healthcare providers can ensure that they are dealing with legit patients. Therefore, the sector is providing services like digital onboarding and keeping data safe in databases. This way the paper method can come to an end.
The process involves the following steps:
- In the first step, patients are required to upload identity documents including passports, ID cards, or driver’s licenses. They can do this by either taking a picture from their cellphones or a webcam.
- Patients are asked to upload a live picture. The system will scan this, extract features, and create a 3D face map. This step ensures the liveness of patients.
- Moving on, the system authenticates the documents by running scans on pictures and information. It makes sure that documents are not forged or fake.
- In this step, the system carries out ID verification for pharmacies and healthcare providers to make sure that the patient satisfies the minimum age requirement. Alongside this, it cross-checks the data within the one present in the database to
- The system then fetches results and stores them in the database while presenting them in front of the end-user.
Moving on, alongside identity, age is also crucial for KYP. This is because a diabetic patient aged 50 can not be given the same treatment as a patient of 35 years. Through age verification, healthcare providers figure out the desired treatments. Pharmacies use this to identify, if or not, any minor is trying to get their hands on age-restricted medicines.
More than One Benefits of Identifying Patient
The information that is stored in the healthcare sector database is huge and more sensitive than any other sector. If it’s compromised, the global health data will be put at stake. Many Healthcare software has already revolutionized the world. Therefore, to ensure a positive patient experience and accurate assistance, patient ID verification for pharmacies is a latest and vital essential.
Compliance with Regulations
For authentic functioning, the US and other countries have implemented regulatory compliance for the healthcare sector. As per them, it is mandatory to verify identity alongside the age of patients. The regulations include the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 and the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act of 2009. Failure in compliance will cost the respective sector hefty penalties and fines.
Medical Identity Theft Prevention
As evident from previous years, the pandemic caused several issues like medical identity theft, false invoices, fake prescriptions, and inaccurate treatments. Furthermore, criminals have gone advanced and they easily exploit any loophole left unattended. However, because of this, the legit patients suffer. They face insurance fraud and lose their chance of sponsored treatments. Criminals make fake profiles and identities to misuse the data for personal gain. Other instances include minors faking the age to buy medicines and supplements that are age-restricted. Hence, patient age verification alongside identity has become mandatory for healthcare centers to prevent risks.
Reduction in Information Discrepancies
Another damaging concern for the healthcare sector is mistyped entries of patients’ information. The chances increase when data is stored physically because human error is natural. However, if patients digitally upload their verification documents, there will be fewer chances of error and fake entries. The data will be kept safe in the database and healthcare providers can access it in the future as well. Know Your Patient (KYP) verification services here can rescue the scenario.
In a Nutshell
Know Your Patient (KYP) is the need of the hour for t healthcare centers, service providers, and pharmacies. This is so as identity frauds are rising with chances of mistyped information. Hence central authorities have obliged the healthcare sector to adhere to ‘Verify Patient Identity’ protocols.
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