WASHINGTON (AP) — The nation's largest doctors' group said Monday it won't try to block Medicare's release of billing records for 880,000 physicians, although it continues to oppose the government's recent decision to open up the massive data trove.
An official of the American Medical Association told The Associated Press that the group won't go to court ahead of Wednesday's scheduled release. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the organization's policies allow only certain designated representatives to make on-the-record comments.
Considered the mother lode of information on doctors, the Medicare claims database has been off-limits to the public for decades, blocked in the courts by physician groups who argue its release would do more harm than good.
Employers, insurers, media organizations and consumer groups interested in physician quality have been pressing the government to open up the files. Last week, the Obama administration announced it would do so.
Over time, public access to the data could change the way medicine is practiced in America. Essentially it would enable analysts — and through them, consumers — to peer over the shoulders of individual physicians. Doctor ratings, now often based on the opinions of other physicians, would be driven by hard data, like statistics on baseball players.
Medical practice would have to change to accommodate big data. Insurers, acting as the intermediaries for employers and government programs, would use the Medicare numbers to demand that low-performing doctors measure up. Such scrutiny would probably accelerate trends toward large medical groups and doctors working as employees instead of in small practices.
"Over the past 30 years, the landscape has changed with respect to physician information that is available to the public," Medicare deputy administrator Jonathan Blum said in a letter last week to the AMA. "As a result, the health care system is changing from a system dominated by dearth of usable, actionable information to one where care coordination and dramatically enhanced data availability ... will power greater innovation, higher quality, increased productivity and lower costs."
The AMA responds that unfiltered files may contain inaccuracies. It worries that the numbers may not look good for accomplished doctors who take on the most severely ill patients, or for practitioners working in economically depressed areas. The group is asking the government to allow doctors to review and correct their information prior to its release.
A "broad approach to releasing physician payment data will mislead the public into making inappropriate and potentially harmful treatment decisions and will result in unwarranted bias against physicians that can destroy careers," said AMA president Ardis Dee Hoven.
Supporters of disclosure say the information will help lead consumers to doctors who have the greatest expertise and who get the best results. For example, if you're about to undergo heart bypass, you could find out how many operations your surgeon did last year. Research shows that for many procedures, patients are better off going to a surgeon who performs them frequently.
The data could also be used to spot fraud, such as doctors billing for seeing more patients in a day than they would reasonably be expected to care for.
The AMA's decision does not rule out last-minute legal action by other groups.