Peter Basch, M.D., medical director of Ambulatory Clinical Systems at MedStar Health, recently worked with the National Council for Prescription Drug Programs (NCPDP, Scottsdale, Ariz.) and representatives from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS, Washington, D.C.), to revise a set of regulations to prevent tampering with printouts of electronic prescriptions for Medicaid patients.
According to MedStar (Columbia, Md.), this 2007 federal law is aimed at reducing the estimated $100 million yearly loss on fraudulent Medicaid prescriptions. The revised anti-tampering requirements focus on utilizing new print technologies that make it difficult to fraudulently reproduce the electronic prescription print-outs, rather than using expensive tamper-proof paper, as originally mandated by Medicaid, says the company.
