New York Hospital Trades Insurance Cards for Vein Scanners

Langone Medical Center in New York is streamlining the hospital check-in process with specialized scanners from Fujitsu that recognize the unique vein pattern of your palm.With these scanners, there's no need to flash your insurance card or fill out long forms when you enter the hospital. You don't even have to be conscious.

Each scan is saved as a numeric code and tied to your medical record, but it's not stored with the record. So relax, voyeuristic hospital personnel can't ogle your beautiful blood vein patterns.Besides efficiency, the hospital hopes these scanners will reduce medical errors which is a good thing. These mistakes cause almost 100,000 deaths and cost the medical profession almost $20 billion each year.