Sunshine Act Physician Registration Open until August 27

Only Opportunity for Physicians to Review and Dispute 2013 Data

Registration is now open for physicians who want to review Open Payments data reported about them by industry before it is available to the public. 

Passed as part of the Affordable Care Act, the "Physicians Payments Sunshine Act," now known as "Open Payments," requires that certain manufacturers and group purchasing organizations (GPOs) report to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) information about payments or other transfers of value they've made to physicians or teaching hospitals. Manufacturers have submitted data to CMS on payments or values of transfers made to physicians and teaching hospital between August 1 and December 31, 2013. The law requires that these providers be given at least 45 days to review and challenge any inaccurate or misleading data before it is made public.

Physicians wanting to review their data must register with CMS. This registration process will occur in two phases. As the first step, physicians must register in CMS' Enterprise Portal. CMS has a step-by-step guide for Enterprise Portal registration.

By law, all reported information must be made public no later than September 30 of this year.

CMS will host an Open Payments provider call on July 22, 2:30-4 pm. CMS experts will give a brief introductory presentation about Open Payments and provide an overview of the registration and review and dispute process. Registration for the call is required.

More information about Open Payments is available on CMS' Website.