National Practitioner Data Bank (NPDB)

The NPDB was created by the Health Care Quality Improvement Act of 1986 and began operating in 1990. It is run by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA). Insurers must report malpractice payments made on behalf of practitioners, and licensing boards and hospitals report certain adverse actions.

The full data bank is confidential and available only to authorized entities, but HRSA publishes a de-identified Public Use Data File. It includes payment amounts, the year of the incident and of payment, the practitioner's license type, the allegation and the severity of injury.

Because it records only paid claims, the public file describes how much and how quickly claims pay, not how often claims are filed or dropped.