; sense of Congress (a) Findings Congress finds the following: (1) The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ (CMS) Blue Button 2.0 Program was announced in April 2018 to build upon CMS’s Blue Button Program. (2) The Blue Button 2.0 Program provides 4 years of Medicare part A, B, and D data for 53 million Medicare beneficiaries through an Application Programming Interface (API). The data contains a variety of information including, but not limited to, a list of a patient’s providers, prescriptions, tests, and diagnoses. The Blue Button 2.0 Program requires the use of CMS-approved applications to allow beneficiaries to download coded data. (3) Mobile applications currently exist that have the power to decode the Medicare Blue Button data and present it in a user-friendly, easy-to-read and understand format. Prior to Blue Button 2.0, the Blue Button Program allowed beneficiaries to download such data, but the information was not decoded into the easy-to-read and understand format that a mobile application provides. (4) The Blue Button 2.0 Program was created to empower patients with the use of these applications, but additional steps need to be taken in order to ensure the program reaches its intended purpose of providing patients with their personal medical claim information to prevent harmful medical errors and reducing redundant spending. (5) According to a study published by Johns Hopkins University in 2016, more than 250,000 deaths per year are due to medical error, making it the 3rd leading cause of death in the United States. Further, millions of dollars are wasted on duplicative or unnecessary tests and procedures. (b) Sense of Congress It is the sense of Congress that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ Blue Button 2.0 Program has the potential to positively influence patient behavior, improve patient safety and health outcomes, and help reduce unnecessary health care expenditures, but action needs to be taken to help the initiative meet the program’s goals. 3. Promoting patient access to