System Name: "Health Plan Management System (HPMS)," HHS/CMS/CBC.
Security Classification: Level Three Privacy Act Sensitive Data.
System Location(s): The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Data Center, 7500 Security Boulevard, North Building, First Floor, Baltimore, Maryland 21244-1850 and at various co-locations of CMS agents.
Categories of Individuals Covered by the System: Information is collected and maintained on recipients of Medicare Part A (Hospital Insurance) and Part B (supplementary medical insurance) services who are enrolled in Medicare health plans and prescription drug plans. Identifiable information will also be collected on individuals who are, but not limited to, complainants, including beneficiaries, relatives and caregivers, Congresspersons and their staff, State Health Insurance Program representatives, and providers of service and their staff.
Categories of Records in the System: The system contains demographic and identifying data, as well as survey and deficiency data. Identifying data includes, but is not limited to: name, title, address, city, state, ZIP code, e-mail address, telephone numbers, fax number, licensure number, SSN, Federal tax identification number, alias names, date of birth, gender, date admitted and/or date discharged. In addition, the CTM stores complaint data, including, but not limited to, the following: date complaint received; date of incident; issue level; complainant and/or beneficiary information; complaint summary; complaint category; complaint resolution summary; and plan resolution summary.
Authority for Maintenance of the System: Authority for maintenance of the system is given under section 1875 of the Social Security Act (the Act) (42 U.S.C. 1395ll), entitled Studies and Recommendations; section 1121 of the Act (42 U.S.C. 1121), entitled Uniform Reporting System for Health Services Facilities and Organizations; and § 1876 of the Act (42 U.S.C. 1395mm), entitled Payments to Health Maintenance Organizations and Competitive Medical Plans. Authority for maintenance and dissemination of Health Plan information is also given under the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 (Pub. L. 105-33).
Purpose(s): The primary purpose of this modified system is to collect and maintain information on Medicare beneficiaries enrolled in Medicare Health Plans in order to develop and disseminate information required by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 that will inform beneficiaries and the public of indicators of health plan performance to help beneficiaries choose among health plans, support quality improvement activities within the plans, monitor and evaluate quality improvement activities within the plans, monitor and evaluate care provided by health plans; provide guidance to program management and policies, and provide a research data base for CMS and other researchers. The information retrieved from this system of records will also be disclosed to: (1) Support regulatory, reimbursement, and policy functions performed within the Agency or by a contractor or consultant; (2) assist another Federal and/or state agency, agency of a state government, an agency established by state law, or its fiscal agent, for evaluating and monitoring the quality of home health care and contribute to the accuracy of health insurance operations; (3) support research, evaluation, or epidemiological projects related to the prevention of disease or disability, or the restoration or maintenance of health, and for payment related projects; (4) support the functions of Quality Improvement Organizations (QIO); (5) support litigation involving the Agency; (6) combat fraud and abuse in certain health care programs.
Routine Uses of Records Maintained in the System, Including Categories of Users and the Purposes of such Uses:
A. The Privacy Act allows us to disclose information without an individual's consent if the information is to be used for a purpose that is compatible with the purpose(s) for which the information was collected. Any such compatible use of data is known as a "routine use." The proposed routine uses in this system meet the compatibility requirement of the Privacy Act. We are proposing to establish the following routine use disclosures of information maintained in the system:
1. To agency contractors, or consultants, or to a grantee of a CMS-administered grant program who have been engaged by the agency to assist in the accomplishment of a CMS function relating to the purposes for this system and who need to have access to the records in order to assist CMS.
2. To another Federal and/or state agency, agency of a state government, an agency established by state law, or its fiscal agent to:
a. Contribute to the accuracy of CMS' proper payment of Medicare benefits,
b. Enable such agency to administer a Federal health benefits program, or as necessary to enable such agency to fulfill a requirement of a Federal statute or regulation that implements a health benefits program funded in whole or in part with Federal funds, and/or
c. Assist Federal/state Medicaid programs within the state.
3. To assist an individual or organization for research, evaluation or epidemiological projects related to the prevention of disease or disability, or the restoration or maintenance of health, and for payment related projects.
4. To Quality Improvement Organizations (QIO) in order to assist the QIO to perform Title XI and Title XVIII functions relating to assessing and improving quality of care.
5. To the Department of Justice (DOJ), court or adjudicatory body when:
a. The agency or any component thereof, or
b. Any employee of the agency in his or her official capacity, or
c. Any employee of the agency in his or her individual capacity where the DOJ has agreed to represent the employee, or
d. The United States Government is a party to litigation or has an interest in such litigation, and by careful review, CMS determines that the records are both relevant and necessary to the litigation and that the use of such records by the DOJ, court or adjudicatory body is compatible with the purpose for which the agency collected the records.
6. To assist a CMS contractor (including, but not necessarily limited to fiscal intermediaries and carriers) that assists in the administration of a CMS-administered health benefits program, or to a grantee of a CMS-administered grant program, when disclosure is deemed reasonably necessary by CMS to prevent, deter, discover, detect, investigate, examine, prosecute, sue with respect to, defend against, correct, remedy, or otherwise combat fraud or abuse in such program.
7. To assist another Federal agency or to an instrumentality of any governmental jurisdiction within or under the control of the United States (including any State or local governmental agency), that administers, or that has the authority to investigate potential fraud or abuse in, a health benefits program funded in whole or in part by Federal funds, when disclosure is deemed reasonably necessary by CMS to prevent, deter, discover, detect, investigate, examine, prosecute, sue with respect to, defend against, correct, remedy, or otherwise combat fraud or abuse in such programs.
B. Additional Provisions Affecting Routine Use Disclosures
To the extent this system contains Protected Health Information (PHI) as defined by HHS regulation "Standards for Privacy of Individually Identifiable Health Information" (45 CFR Parts 160 and 164, 65 Fed. Reg. 82462 (12-28-00), Subparts A and E. Disclosures of such PHI that are otherwise authorized by these routine uses may only be made if, and as, permitted or required by the "Standards for Privacy of Individually Identifiable Health Information."
In addition, our policy will be to prohibit release even of data not directly identifiable, except pursuant to one of the routine uses or if required by law, if we determine there is a possibility that an individual can be identified through implicit deduction based on small cell sizes (instances where the patient population is so small that individuals could, because of the small size, use this information to deduce the identity of the beneficiary).
Policies and Practices for Storing, Retrieving, Accessing, Retaining, and Disposing of Records in the System—
Storage: All records are stored on the magnetic disk sub-system of the Sun Solaris 10 Server. Furthermore, these records are saved to magnetic tape backup on a nightly basis.
Retrievability: The records are retrieved by health insurance claims number or other individually identifying numbers.
Safeguards: CMS has safeguards in place for authorized users and monitors such users to ensure against excessive or unauthorized use. Personnel having access to the system have been trained in the Privacy Act and information security requirements. Employees who maintain records in this system are instructed not to release data until the intended recipient agrees to implement appropriate management, operational and technical safeguards sufficient to protect the confidentiality, integrity and availability of the information and information systems and to prevent unauthorized access.
This system will conform to all applicable Federal laws and regulations and Federal, HHS, and CMS policies and standards as they relate to information security and data privacy. These laws and regulations may apply but are not limited to: the Privacy Act of 1974; the Federal Information Security Management Act of 2002; the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986; the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996; the E-Government Act of 2002, the Clinger-Cohen Act of 1996; the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003, and the corresponding implementing regulations. OMB Circular A-130, Management of Federal Resources, Appendix III, Security of Federal Automated Information Resources also applies. Federal, HHS, and CMS policies and standards include but are not limited to: all pertinent National Institute of Standards and Technology publications; the HHS Information Systems Program Handbook and the CMS Information Security Handbook.
Retention and Disposal: CMS will retain identifiable HPMS data for at least 10 years or as long as needed for program research.
System Manager(s) and Address(es):
Director, Division of Plan Data, Plan Oversight and Accountability Group, Center for Beneficiary Choices, Center for Medicare & Medicaid Services, 7500 Security Boulevard, C4-14-21, Baltimore, Maryland 21244-1850.
Notification Procedure: For purpose of access, the subject individual should write to the system manager who will require the system name, HICN, address, date of birth, and gender, and for verification purposes, the subject individual's name (woman's maiden name, if applicable), and SSN. Furnishing the SSN is voluntary, but it may make searching for a record easier and prevent delay.
Record Access Procedures: For purpose of access, use the same procedures outlined in Notification Procedures above. Requestors should also specify the record contents being sought. (These procedures are in accordance with department regulation 45 CFR 5b.5(a)(2)).
Contesting Record Procedures: The subject individual should contact the system manager named above, and reasonably identify the records and specify the information to be contested. State the corrective action sought and the reasons for the correction with supporting justification. (These Procedures are in accordance with Department regulation 45 CFR 5b.7).
Record Source Categories: The identifying information contained in these records is obtained from the health plan and Part D organizations (which obtained the data from the individual concerned) or the individuals themselves. Also, these data will be linked with CMS administrative data, such as claims and enrollment.
System Exempted from Certain Provisions of the Act: None.
