21st Century Cures Act and Information Blocking

The 21st Century Cures Act introduces a new impermissible activity to the health care industry of information blocking. This new law makes it illegal for health care providers, health information technology vendors, health information networks and health information exchanges to block electronic access to health information. The law directed the Secretary of Health and Human Services to adopt regulations further defining what would be permissible activities. These regulations were published May 2, 2020, with a compliance date of Nov. 2, 2020. The result is a wide-sweeping change in the way health care entities must think about access to and use of electronic