Every line on a medical bill carries a five-digit number, and that number is private property. A price transparency group has now asked a federal court to change that, suing the American Medical Association over its copyright in the Current Procedural Terminology system, which federal law requires providers and insurers to use.
PatientRightsAdvocate.org filed the complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. The group is not seeking damages. It has bought a copy of the current codebook and is asking a judge to declare that scanning it and publishing it online in a free, searchable format would not infringe an enforceable copyright, according to reporting on the filing.
