Study: Unique patient identifiers could save $77 billion

Smarter use of existing technologies could save as much, if not more, on healthcare costs for developing new technology, a new RAND study finds. After all, unique patient identifiers (UPIs) already exist as a technology, and if they are used consistently, they can reduce medical errors, simplify electronic transactions and increase efficiency.

The RAND study also found that there was a potential savings of $77 billion per year if adoptions of UPIs reach a rate of 90 percent. This makes the one-time cost of somewhere between $1.5 billion and $11.1 billion to implement them look like a drop in the bucket.

This is part of a larger vision shared by many of the technology giants. For example, Microsoft argues that when combined with certificates, smart cards offer the cornerstone of a new world of security identities, including smart card-certificate combos, simple enough so that revocation and exceptions are easy to manage.

How much more could we save by implementing simple technologies that already exist, like UPIs, on a widespread basis? The Healthcare Administrative Simplification Coalition estimates that the healthcare industry could cut hundreds of billions of cost from the system if healthcare leaders aggressively cut needless redundancy and unnecessary complexity from the system.

To learn more about the RAND study:
- read this Modern Healthcare piece (reg. req)

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