Biometric patient authentication growing throughout healthcare market

The healthcare market is exploring a range of applications for biometric patient identity verification to reduce fraud and human error, and improve outcomes, as shown by a series of announcements over the latter part of February.

Healthcare IT security company Imprivata announced this week that it has expanded its PatientSecure patient identification platform. Patient misidentification has become rampant, Impriveta says, impacting patient care and hospital’s financial results. To combat this problem, PatientSecure now features self-service patient registration workflows, and identity verification at each point of care, and is supported by a new adoption program.

Verato has announced a partnership to integrate its cloud-based match-as-a-service technology with RightPatient‘s biometric patient identity platform. The partnership provides healthcare enterprises with a single point of convergence for the full lifecycle of patient data, according to the companies. With RightPatient’s biometric technology for the front-end, and Verato’s referential matching technology for the back-end, the companies say they can link pre-existing data to the correct identity, across systems and between healthcare providers.

Biometrics are also being applied outside of hospitals through a partnership between remote breathalyzer maker Soberlink and patient engagement platform provider MAP Health Management. The companies have partnered for a pilot program to provide remote patient monitoring for alcohol use disorder. The Soberlink uses facial recognition to verify the patient’s identity, allowing for the early intervention critical to improving addiction treatment outcomes, according to MobiHealthNews.

Identity verification is also an issue for clinical trials, and High Point Clinical Trials Center (HPCTC) has partnered with Verified Clinical Trials to launch early and late-phase trials of a fingerprint registration system to prevent duplicate enrolment in clinical trials, reports Outsourcing-Pharma.com. The quality of data in a clinical trial could be compromised by subjects of the trial participating in other ones without disclosing that information, according to HPCTC executive vice president Doug Copeland.

While hospitals may be the most obvious healthcare market for biometrics, the range of applications and number of projects in their early stages suggest a wide range of opportunities for adoption and improved results.

Article Topics

biometric authentication  |  biometrics  |  healthcare  |  Imprivata  |  patient identification  |  RightPatient