New York, Puerto Rico Plan Medical ‘Smart Card’ Pilot Program for CHIP Program Beneficiaries

Under a pilot program recently announced by Govs. George Pataki (R-N.Y.) and Sila Calderon (D-Puerto Rico), select CHIP program beneficiaries would receive "smart cards" that would track their medical information, the Albany Times Union reports (Albany Times Union, 2/25). Designed to reduce errors and fraud, the cards would store a beneficiary's medical information, such as allergies, immunizations and prescriptions, on a bar code (Rosenberg, Gannett News Service, 2/20). In New York, the cards would be given to about 1,000 children enrolled in Child Health Plus, the state's CHIP program, who receive treatment at Benedictine Hospital in Kingston, N.Y. About 15,000 children in Puerto Rico also would receive the cards. Pataki said the test program would cost $300,000 but did not provide an cost estimate for implementing the program statewide (Albany Times Union, 2/25). "We will cut down on medical mistakes enormously by doing this," Pataki said (Gannett News Service, 2/20). The Times Union reports that Pataki's announcement might be "prematur[e]" because he has not yet run the program and its no-bid contract past the state comptroller, who has 90 days to review the plan, the Times Union reports. A spokesperson for the Health Department said that Welch Allyn was selected to run the program because it had developed the system, adding that the comptroller's review is not expected to delay the start of the test (Albany Times Union, 2/25).