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New York Legislation Requires PBMs to Obtain Licensure Through State

S.3762/A.1396: New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed into law legislation that requires pharmacy benefit managers (“PBMs”) in New York to register with the State and obtain licensure by 2023. Effective March 31, 2022, the new law also specifies PBMs duties and obligations as service providers and allows the New York Department of Financial Services to receive complaints when a PBM violates the law.

ONC Releases New Guidelines and Data for Health Information‑Sharing

The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (“ONC”) published the Trusted Exchange Framework and the Common Agreement (“TEFCA”), which outlines the requirements for nationwide information‑sharing for healthcare organizations. TEFCA establishes health information exchange principles and a strategy on how to support and govern data exchange and technical infrastructure.

The ONC also released Version 1.0 of Project US@, which is a healthcare specification for representing patient addresses to improve patient matching. By standardizing entry of patient addresses, the specification will advance the healthcare industry’s proficiency in recording and managing accurate and consistently formatted patient addresses and support more efficient patient matching and record linkage.

Administrative Simplification HIPAA Regulations Fact Sheet Released

On behalf of the Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”), the National Standards Group (“NSG”) has created a new fact sheet summarizing the HIPAA Administrative Simplification regulations. The regulations include a number of provisions designed to streamline and simplify healthcare transactions and help the healthcare community save time and money. To learn about how to stay compliant with the regulations, you can access the fact sheet here.