It used to be that when I called a doctor’s office to make an appointment or get a prescription refill, they asked for my name. Same thing if I called the pharmacy or was picking up a prescription. I suppose they might have then asked for my birth date if they had two patients with the same name, but that never happened. At some point in the past few years, they started asking for my birth date first. And then of course, they ask for my name anyway. I would have assumed it had something to do with HIPAA, but they still ask for my name. So what’s the advantage of looking up records by birth date?
Faster and more reliable way to pull up records. Names are fluid, abbreviated, mis-heard, mis-pronounced, etc. A birth date is a given fact that does not change. Asking for your name is confirmation and a security issue.
My spouse has a locally common name. Those with that name used to receive each other’'s prescriptions and health visit mail. Not anymore since name plus DOB was instituted.
I have no idea why since no two people have the same name. Seriously though, it’s really the combination of name and birthdate that identify a person. It is much easier to type in the birthdate correctly than to deal with the various spellings of names.
An additional reason is patient privacy to avoid identifying patients by name where others can hear. Usually just the birthdate and and first or last name is sufficient, and after checking in often only first names are said out loud.
Ask John Smith. Actually, what if there were two John Smiths with the same birthdate? What are the odds?
About 50/50 for any random set of 23 John Smiths.
Ah, good point.
For example, what if you call in and tell them your name is “Bill Schultz” but they have your records filed under “William” (or vice versa). Or what if they search for your name under “Shultz” or “Schulz” or “Shulz” or “Shults” or some other spelling.
For the same reason that when I call the local newspaper’s office to tell them that I will be going on vacation and want to stop delivery of the newspaper during my vacation, they ask for my telephone number rather than my name. First, the telephone number identifies a home more clearly than a name, since many newspapers are delivered to homes with several occupants, so the occupants don’t have to remember whose name the newspaper is paid for in. Second, a telephone number can be punched into a telephone keyboard easily, while a name can’t (and this process is mostly done without talking to anyone). Third, because it’s hard to spell many names. Despite the fact that I don’t have a difficult name to spell, I always spell out my name when talking to a business on the telephone so that it’s never necessary for the person I’m talking to to ask how my name is spelled.
I know that was a joke but that isn’t right. The question includes the year as well as the day and month so the odds are much lower than that. I could happen but it would be rare and likely caught by the tech or the person picking up the prescription.
Yeah, with the date it’s incredibly unlikely. It should be caught on a computer, once name or birthdate is entered it will display a list of matching patients. With both items it is extremely rare to have duplicates. Since I worked on medical systems using a lot of test data I have seen it. There were a lot of deliberately created duplicates in the database for development and testing.
The inverse problem is unduplicating merged databases, common these days since there are so many mergers. The same person can be recorded with different names in several databases and sometimes even with different birthdates.
Pizza places also ask for the telephone number rather than the name. The computer databases that pizza places use are actually indexed by telephone number rather than name. It’s far less ambiguous. They’ll call up the record under that number and then the name and address are confirmed verbally.
I’ve been getting asked for my phone number by newspapers and for restaurant orders for so long that if the doctors and pharmacy asked for the phone number I wouldn’t have even had any questions. Thanks for the answers!
Tell that to the Jim Smith Society.
My company manages a system for Dept. of Education that manages accounts for access to the student loan system. You must provide your last name, SSN, and birthday, which are assumed be a unique combination. Except they’re not. There was a case a few years ago of twins who were issued the same SSN by accident. It was never addressed until they found out it prevented them from applying for student loans.
I think that in a lot of situations the OP brings up they already have your name. E.g., it comes up on caller ID. And even just the number is enough to tie into your record. They just need some verification to prune it down to one person.
When I show up at the dentist (and was new to the people or vice versa) they ask for a phone number. The number of people showing up for an appointment is quite small. And as pointed out, it’s faster to type in, less chance of questions like “Is that with one or two 'f’s?”, plus a tiny bit of extra security. An impostor has to have an extra piece of information. (That is actually not all that hard to find.)
A long time ago, the pharmacy we went to indexed everything by phone number. We got someone’s phone number who had used that chain. So we found out a lot more about those people than we should have because the pharmacists kept asking us about refills for Rxs for those other people and such. :eek:
The thing is, every doctor/pharmacy that I ever went to asked for your DOB after they’ve looked up your name. They are clearly using your name to pull up the record, and using the DOB to confirm it’s the right person.
My dentist’s office always asks for DoB first. They used to ask for name first some time in the past but not anymore.
The receptionist in my dental office doesn’t have to ask for my name. 
I give my clinic my name, and then they ask for date of birth. Sometimes they ask for a phone number also. When I get blood work done they always ask for DOB to confirm that it’s me.
That’s my experience, too. Except for the place that has its own ID number, and asks me for that, first.
I expect when they enter a DOB a list of names with that DOB come up. Then they just click on the last name you gave them. Sometimes the first name.