On March 9, 2020, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Office of the National Coordinator for health IT (ONC) released policies that give patients better access to their health information through greater interoperability.
According to the CMS, the "final rule" is focused on driving interoperability and patient access to health information by liberating patient data using CMS authority to regulate Medicare Advantage (MA), Medicaid, CHIP, and Qualified Health Plan (QHP) issuers on the Federally-facilitated Exchanges (FFEs).
The new policies include:
- Patient Access API (applicable January 1, 2021)
- Provider Directory API (applicable January 1, 2021)
- Payer-to-Payer Data Exchange (applicable January 1, 2022)
- Improving the Dually Eligible Experience by Increasing the Frequency of Federal-State Data Exchanges (applicable April 1, 2022)
- Public Reporting and Information Blocking (applicable late 2020)
- Digital Contact Information (applicable late 2020)
- Admission, Discharge, and Transfer Event Notifications (applicable spring 2021)