How to see your secret ‘health credit report’ files

Written by |
Advertisement

Almost everyone knows that you have a credit report that monitors the health of your finances. But do you know you have a “health credit report” that insurers check when deciding whether or not to take you on as a new customer?

Taking a peek behind the insurance curtain…

In the era of electronic medical records, ExamOne and Milliman are a couple of large organizations that make money compiling information about prescriptions on an estimated 200 million Americans. The dossiers they assemble on us are then sold to a variety of insurers, particularly life insurance companies.

This extensive yet secretive gathering of info is nothing new. One decade ago, The Washington Post reported that a company called Ingenix had a business crunching a “pharmacy risk score” on you to tell insurers the risk level you pose to them as a potential customer.

Ingenix changed its name to OptumInsight and was bought by ExamOne in 2014.

ExamOne — a Quest Diagnostics company — compiles much of the info it has on you from direct lab tests.

Companies like Milliman, meanwhile, obtain their information from pharmacy benefits managers (PBMs). PBMs are a very popular option because they offer cheaper prices when you get your drugs online or through the mail instead of at a retail pharmacy.

If you have privacy concerns about prescriptions, you can always be proactive about this issue and opt out of information sharing under the terms of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA).

But chances are you already may have active dossiers on file with one or both of these companies. The info is assembled into what’s colloquially referred to as a “health credit report.”

Fortunately, you are allowed to see your report if you get in direct touch with the company.

By the way, this is a smart thing to do particularly when you’re applying for life insurance. You’ll want to double-check to make sure the insurer isn’t giving you a more expensive premium because there’s a mix-up on your pharmacy report. Maybe it says you take a medication that you’ve never been prescribed.  In that case, each company has its own process by which you can correct the mistaken info on your report.

Advertisement

But it all starts by seeing what’s in your report!

You can obtain your free report for ExamOne by calling 844-225-8047.

Milliman also allows you to obtain a free copy of its IntelliScript report, which is its version of a prescription history on you. Visit this page to get started with your request or call 877-211-4816.

Finally, another even broader credit report-style dossier is compiled by an organization called MIB Group. MIB (formerly the Medical Information Bureau) tracks anyone who has applied for individually underwritten life, health, or disability income insurance during the past seven years.

To see what’s in your free MIB report, call 866-692-6901 or fill out this form and mail it to the organization.

Advertisement