MATCH IT Act of 2026

S. 5246 — MATCH IT Act of 2026 would require the Department of Health and Human Services to fix a specific, well-documented problem in health IT: patients not being reliably matched to their own medical records. Within 180 days of enactment, the Secretary would have to create a standard, government-wide definition of "patient match rate," and the National Coordinator would separately have to identify a minimum set of data elements needed to support matching patients at a 99.9% accuracy rate, adding those elements to the national interoperability data standard. These requirements would later be folded into official certification criteria for electronic health record systems and into Medicare's interoperability program rules, on set timelines (2 years after certification, respectively).

The bill affects HHS and the National Coordinator for Health IT, who take on new rulemaking and standard-setting duties; EHR and health IT vendors, whose products would eventually need to meet the new certification requirements; and health care providers participating in Medicare, who could voluntarily report accurate patient-matching data and receive a bonus payment adjustment for meeting certain match-rate thresholds, without penalty for opting out. The bill states that no entity would be required to hit the 99.9% matching rate itself — that figure applies only to the data standard, not a mandatory performance target.

The bill was introduced in the Senate by Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA), with Sen. Jim Banks as a cosponsor, on August 5, 2026, and referred to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. It would need to be reported out of committee, pass the Senate and House, and be signed into law before any of its provisions take effect.

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