New MedFico Scores Must Be Covered By The FCRA
February 19, 2008 – 7:46 pmby Geoffrey H. Baskerville, Esquire Under a system that could begin operation as early as this summer, hospitals could check a patient’s specially designed medical credit score to determine the patient’s ability to pay his or her hospital bill. The new MedFico score is being developed by Healthcare Analytics, a technology firm from Massachusetts. Money to develop the new scoring system is coming from Fair Isaac; Tenant Healthcare Corp., and North Bridge Venture Capital Partners, a venture capital firm. Each is reported to have contributed $10 million to the project. While proponents of the new system claim that it is necessary for hospitals to be able to assess the amount of money coming in and thereby be able to determine if they have the resources to pay for various projects, others worry that the system will be used to determine if a patient should be treated. Tenet already uses a system that ranks ...