Mount Sinai Health System has deployed biometric patient identity verification across all of its ambulatory practices and urgent care sites in New York City, becoming the first health system in the city to implement such a system at scale. The rollout uses CLEAR technology to verify patients at the point of care, with returning patients confirming their identity via selfie and new patients completing a selfie matched against a government-issued photo ID.
The deployment integrates directly with MyChart, meaning biometric verification is now part of the routine check-in process rather than a separate enrollment step or one-time identity-proofing event. That integration gives the system a different operational character than typical pilot programs: it applies to every patient interaction across multiple site types, not just online account setup.
Healthcare has become an increasingly active market for liveness-based and document-backed identity verification, driven by the need to match patients to the correct medical record at intake. Mount Sinai’s implementation brings that verification directly into the physical care encounter, applying it at ambulatory clinics and urgent care sites alike.
The health system framed the launch as a system-wide operating change rather than a departmental test, positioning biometric check-in as a standard part of patient access going forward. Mount Sinai said the deployment is the first of its kind for a New York City health system.
