DEA Plans for Biometrics to Identify and Manage Electronic Prescribing

US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) is proposing biometric identifiers to authenticate the identity of hospitals, healthcare providers, and pharmacies prescribing controlled substances. Electronic Prescriptions for Controlled Substances regulations revisions states “Biometric authentication means authentication based on measurement of the individual’s physical features or repeatable actions where those features or actions are both distinctive to the individual and measurable.”

In the new policy the use of a biometric is suggested as well as a hard token or a password. If a hard token is used, it must meet specified security standards and it will be stored separately from the prescribing computer.
Controlled substances such as opioids, stimulants, depressants, hallucinogens, and anabolic steroids. constitute between 10% and 11% of all prescriptions written in the U.S.

The proposal estimates that biometric readers would be needed for every practitioner’s computer that hospitals would need a reader one for every 15 beds, and each clinic would need an average of two readers. The Electronic Prescriptions for Controlled Substances Report states that based on American Hospital Association data the DEA estimates the number of community hospital beds to be 802,658. The number of clinics is estimated to be 7,485.

Source: Drug Enforcement Administration, 21 CFR Parts 1300, 1304, 1306, and 1311 Prescriptions for Controlled Substances; Final Rule
 

Federal Register / Vol. 75, No. 61 / Wednesday, March 31, 2010 / Rules and Regulations