System location:

• Division of Scholarships and Loan Repayments, Bureau of Primary Health Care, Health Resources and Services Administration, 10th Floor, West Tower Building, 4350 East West Highway, Bethesda, Maryland.
• Parklawn Computer Center, 5600 Fishers Lane, Room 2A-53, Rockville, MD 20857.
• Washington National Records Center, 4205 Suitland Road, Suitland, MD 20409.
• PHS Health Data Center, Gillis W. Long Hansen’s Disease Center, Carville, LA 70721.

Categories of individuals covered by the system: Applicants for the recipients of Physician Shortage Area grants in the field of medicine and osteopathy.

Categories of records in the system: Grant applications, awards, and correspondence.

Authority for maintenance of the system: Section 409(b) of the Health Professions Educational Assistance Act of 1976, (42 U.S.C. 259g).

Purpose(s): To select award recipients, and to monitor their payments, their continued eligibility, and their placement in health manpower shortage areas in fulfillment of their service obligations.

Routine uses of records maintained in the system, including categories of users and the purposes of such uses:

1. Disclosure may be made to a congressional office from the record of an individual in response to a verified inquiry from the congressional office made at the written request of that individual.
2. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) may disclose information from this system of records to the Department of Justice, or to a court or other tribunal, when
   1. HHS, or any component thereof; or
   2. Ally HHS employee in his or her official capacity; or
   3. Any HHS employee in his or her individual capacity where the Department of Justice (or HHS, where it is authorized to do so) has agreed to represent the employee; or
   4. The United States or any agency thereof where HHS determines that the litigation is likely to affect HHS or any of its components, is a party to litigation or has an interest in such litigation, and HHS determines that the use of such records by the Department of Justice, the court or other tribunal is revelant and necessary to the litigation and would help in the effective representation of the governmental party, provided, however, that in each case, HHS determines that such disclosure is compatible with the purpose for which the records were collected.
3. In the event that a system of records maintained by this agency to carry out its functions indicates a violation or potential violation of law, whether civil, criminal, or regulatory in nature, and whether arising by general statute or particular program statute, or by regulation, rule or order issued pursuant thereto, the relevant records in the system of records may be referred to the appropriate agency, whether Federal, State or local, charged with the responsibility of investigating or prosecuting such violation or charged with enforcing or implementing the statute or rule, regulation or order issued pursuant thereto.

Disclosure may be made to State Boards of Medical Examiners and to equivalent State licensing boards of professional review actions which adversely affect the clinical privileges of health care professionals who either:

1. Are or were employed by the Federal Government;
2. Provide or have provided health care service under a fee-for-service contract with the Federal Government; or
3. Provide or have provided health care services on behalf of the Federal Government as a volunteer or as a visiting fellow. Boards o’f Medical Examiners and equivalent State licensing boards are required by the Health Care Quality Improvement Act of 1986 and by the Medicare and Medicaid Patient and Program Protection Act of 1987 to report this information to the National Practitioner Data Bank.

Disclosure to consumer reporting agencies: Disclosures pursuant to 5 U.S.C. 552a(b) (12) : Disclosures may be made from this system to “consumer reporting agencies’’ as defined in the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. l58a(f)) or the Federal Claims Collection Act of 1966 (31 U.S.C. 3701(a) (3)). The purposes of this disclosure are: (1) To provide an incentive for debtors to repay delinquent Federal Government debts by making these debts of their credit records, and (2) to enable HRSA to improve the quality of loan and scholarship decisions by taking into account the financial reliability of applicants. Disclosure of records will be limited to the individual’s name, Social Security number (SSN), and other information necessary to establish the identity of the individual, the amount, status, and history of the claim, and the agency or program under which the claim arose.

Policies and practices for storing, retrieving, accessing, retaining, and disposing of records in the system:

• Storage: File folders and magnetic tape.
• Retrievability: Name or program ID number.
• Safeguards:
  
  
  1. Authorized users:Administrative and staff personnel of the Division of Scholarships and Loan Repayments and other components of the Bureau of Primary Health Care who have responsibility for implementing the Program.
  2. Physical safeguards: Magnetic tapes, disks, other computer equipment, and other forms of personal data are stored in areas where fire and life safety codes are strictly enforced. Twenty-four hour, 7-day security guards perform random checks on the physical security of the data. All documents are protected during lunch hours and nonworking hours in locked file cabinets or locked storage areas.
  3. Procedural safeguards: A password is required to access the terminal and a data set name controls the release of data to only authorized users. All users of personal information in connection with the performance of their jobs protect information from public view and from unauthorized personnel entering an unsupervised office. Access to records is strictly limited to those staff members trained in accordance with the Privacy Act.

Implementation guidelines: DHHS Chapter 45-13 and supplementary Chapter PHS.hf: 45-13 of the General Administration Manual; and the DHHS Information Resources Management Manual, Part 6, "ADP Systems
Security."

Retention and disposal: Applications, contracts and other records of selectees to the program are retained through the completion or other disposition of the scholarship service obligation. The records are then sent to the Federal Records Center for a seven year retention period and then disposed of in accordance with the Health Resources and Services Administration Records Control Schedule.

System manager(s) and address:

• Director, Division of Scholarships and Loan Repayments, Bureau of Primary Health Care, Health Resources and Services Administration, 10th Floor, West Tower Building, 4350 East West Highway, Bethesda,
  Maryland.
• MAILING ADDRESS:10th Floor, West Tower Building, 4350 East West Highway, Bethesda, Maryland.
• MAILING ADDRESS: 10th Floor, West Tower Building, 4350 East West Highway, Rockville, MD 20857.

Notification procedure: To determine if a record exists, write to the System Manager. Individual must provide positive identification, such as driver’s license, passport, voter’s registration card, union card, or a written certification verifying his or her identity. Requestors should also reasonably specify the record contents being sought.

Record access procedures: Same as Notification Procedures.

Contesting record procedures: Contact the System Manager giving a reasonable description of the record, specify the information you want to contest, and state the corrective action sought, with supporting justification.

Record source categories: Applicant and applicant’s health professions school.

Systems exempted from certain provisions of the act: None.