Home Health & Hospice Week

Learn these info blocking exceptions.

The 2020 Cures Act Final Rule establishes eight exceptions to information blocking provided certain conditions are met. The exceptions are divided into two categories — those that involve not fulfilling requests; and those that involve procedures for fulfilling requests. Situations that may be considered reasonable and necessary to interfere include:

1. Preventing Harm Exception — to prevent harm to a patient or another person

2. Privacy Exception — to protect an individual’s privacy

3. Security Exception — to protect the security of electronic health information

4. Infeasibility Exception — challenges that limit the ability to comply with a request

5. Health IT Performance Exception — situations that necessitate making health IT temporarily unavailable or to degrade the health IT’s performance for the benefit of the overall performance of the health IT

6. Content and Manner Exception — circumstances that limit the content of a response or the manner in which a request is fulfilled

7. Fees Exception — requests that require charging a fee

8. Licensing Exception — requests that require a license for EHI interoperability elements.

Note: Details of the exceptions, including key conditions to meet them, are at www.healthit.gov/sites/default/files/ page2/2020-03/InformationBlockingExceptions.pdf.