WASHINGTON – Medicare officials must make physician reimbursement data available to the public by Sept. 21, a U.S. district court ordered in late August.
The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services had kept private the data of 40 million patients and 700,000 doctors.
The ruling makes the data available in Consumers’ Checkbook, a Washington, D.C.-based consumer group that filed a lawsuit against the Health and Human Services Department.
“All we have to say at the moment is that the court’s decision is still under review and the agency has not made a decision about whether to appeal,” a CMS spokeswoman said.
The American Medical Association has expressed concern that the data release could have negative effects.
“The AMA is concerned that the indiscriminate release of raw Medicare claims data has the potential to put patient privacy at risk, and will paint an inaccurate and incomplete picture of the quality of physician care, misleading patients,” said the AMA’s Edward Langston, MD.