Belgium’s health insurers have been granted broad new powers to access healthcare providers’ professional data under a law that took effect on 11 August, prompting a furious response from the doctors’ union BVAS.
According to De Standaard and Het Nieuwsblad, the mutualities now officially have access through the InterMutualistic Agency, their data platform, to a large new pool of health data. If a statistical anomaly is detected, such as a doctor or nurse carrying out significantly more procedures than the average colleague, the insurers can now request a full personal profile of that individual across all health insurers.
The data they can access includes all issued prescriptions, the patient’s personal contribution charged, any supplements billed, the date of the treatment, the prescription date, and even periods of the provider’s incapacity for work and benefit records. BVAS said the new law went far too far. “This is not a bridge too far, but a Golden Gate Bridge too far,” board member Jos Vanhoof told De Standaard.
He argued that the health insurers are themselves major players in the care sector and questioned why they should be given so much power. “Will we soon also be allowed to inspect all the financial flows of the health insurers?” he said.
The law was introduced at the initiative of Health Minister Frank Vandenbroucke of Vooruit. It aims to improve the identification of healthcare providers and make fraud easier to detect in the wake of the fraud scandal involving home nurse Stefanie Sander. According to De Standaard, the legislation was sensitive within the government. Vandenbroucke said the power to impose sanctions remains with the Medical Evaluation and Control Service.
