See article: 'Meaningful Use' criteria released
Can you believe it? Doctors and hospitals that purchase electronic health records (EHRs) 'wired' for 'back-door' data mining will be paid to steal and use our sensitive health records without our permission!
The government and the massive health data mining industry won. Industry and the government’s plan to continue illegal and unethical data mining trumped Americans’ rights to health privacy.
The rules guarantee that employers, insurers, banks, and government will be able to use our sensitive health information---from prescriptions to DNA--- to discriminate against us in jobs, credit, and insurance.
Instead, the new interim rules for EHRs should reward the purchase and use of 'smart' EHRs with consent technologies so patients control who can see and use their health records.
The stimulus billions will be wasted because doctors and hospitals will be rewarded for using obsolete, unethical EHR 'clunkers'. Like the UK, the US will be forced to spend billions to correct a disastrously flawed national electronic health system that prevents patients from controlling their health records.
To understand the "meaningful use" criteria that SHOULD be required in EHRs, see the comments submitted to the Administration by the bipartisan Coalition for Patient Privacy, representing millions of Americans: http://www.patientprivacyrights.org/site/DocServer/LCoalition_to_HIT_PC_Meaningful_Use.pdf?docID=5681
When will the Administration and corporations get it? Privacy protections have to be tough and comprehensive if we want a national HIT system that consumers will trust and use.
To act, join www.patientprivacyrights.org to get e-alerts. Stop corporations and the government from using your sensitive health information for uses you would never agree to.
Showing posts with label EHRs. Show all posts
Showing posts with label EHRs. Show all posts
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Monday, December 14, 2009
Facebook setting the standards for Health Care?
No laws forced Facebook to add more consumer control to who sees what --- the public did. See story: Facebook privacy revisions 'sign post' for healthcare
This is EXACTLY what will happen to the health care system when Americans find out they have NO CONTROL over over who sees, uses, and snoops in their electronic health information.
Patient Privacy Rights' job is to make sure they learn as fast as possible.
Sign up at www.patientprivacyrights.org for our e-alerts so you can help!
This is EXACTLY what will happen to the health care system when Americans find out they have NO CONTROL over over who sees, uses, and snoops in their electronic health information.
Patient Privacy Rights' job is to make sure they learn as fast as possible.
Sign up at www.patientprivacyrights.org for our e-alerts so you can help!
Friday, July 24, 2009
Bill O'Reilly is REALLY worried about the loss of his personal medical privacy...
So much so that he repeatedly returned to the topic while debating health care reform last night.
See Editorial with Video
68% of Americans share his fears and "Have Little Confidence that Electronic Health Records Will Remain Confidential" (see: Past Meetings: 7/21/09, slide #3 of the "Privacy and Security Work Group: Recommendations" presentation on the HIT Standards Committee website at: http://healthit.hhs.gov/portal/server.ptopen=512&objID=1271&parentname=CommunityPage&parentid=2&mode=2&in_hi_userid=10741&cached=true
O'Reilly debated with a doctor who doesn't seem to know that we have no control over our personal electronic health records, the massive damage that already causes, and how much more we will all be harmed if the Administration does not stop health IT systems from violating our privacy. Patient control over personal health information must be built into every electronic system up front.
Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, and the majority of Amercians REALLY care about health privacy. The national concensus is that we should control who sees our health records; which has been our legal and ethical right since the nation's founding. Restoring the right to control PHI in electronic health systems will quell fears that the majority has have about electronic systems.
Quotes from the story:
• O’Reilly demonstrated his primary fear – almost panic – over the assumption that his medical records may not be private any more if President Obama passes some version of his healthcare bill. But enough with the foreplay -- O’Reilly dived right into his main fear. “My health records which are now in the hands of my private physician . . . they’re gonna be in Washington, right, so every malady that I have is gonna be seen by people in Washington. I don’t want that, do you want that?”
• After a little back and forth on the issue, O’Reilly repeated, “On a computer disk in D.C. will be what’s wrong with me . . . based on my medical history. It makes me very, very nervous.” Yes, we noticed.
• O’Reilly, again, focused worriedly on the privacy issue. “Let me ask you this,” O’Reilly posited. “It worries me that my medical history and your medical history is now gonna be on a disk in Washington, D.C., rather than the confidentiality of a doctor-patient, which we have had in this country for decades – that’s gone.”
• “The data is going to go to a bank in Washington, D.C.,” O’Reilly fretted. “ . . . I’m talking about you, Dr. Marc Lemont Hill, having a condition . . . with his program, it goes to D.C. and the bureaucracy decides how to treat you, not your physician. Doesn’t that worry you?”
• “So you don’t mind having your condition – whatever it may be – leave your doctor’s office and go to D.C. . . ,” O’Reilly said.
• O’Reilly hammered the privacy issue, once again, saying, “It’s going to a database that can be accessed . . . okay, if you don’t mind it, I do, and that’s a big concern of mine. We don’t have any privacy as it is in this country . . . .”
• Hill pointed out the bigger issue than the privacy of medical records (to most Americans, but not to O’Reilly) is 50 million uninsured Americans – and said that President Obama addressed that in the press conference.
• But the biggest question of all – what’s O’Reilly’s medical condition? The one O’Reilly is terrified might fall into the hands of the government? Is it really so awful that O'Reilly (not usually one to worry about privacy) is willing to kill health care reform just to protect it?
See Editorial with Video
68% of Americans share his fears and "Have Little Confidence that Electronic Health Records Will Remain Confidential" (see: Past Meetings: 7/21/09, slide #3 of the "Privacy and Security Work Group: Recommendations" presentation on the HIT Standards Committee website at: http://healthit.hhs.gov/portal/server.ptopen=512&objID=1271&parentname=CommunityPage&parentid=2&mode=2&in_hi_userid=10741&cached=true
O'Reilly debated with a doctor who doesn't seem to know that we have no control over our personal electronic health records, the massive damage that already causes, and how much more we will all be harmed if the Administration does not stop health IT systems from violating our privacy. Patient control over personal health information must be built into every electronic system up front.
Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, and the majority of Amercians REALLY care about health privacy. The national concensus is that we should control who sees our health records; which has been our legal and ethical right since the nation's founding. Restoring the right to control PHI in electronic health systems will quell fears that the majority has have about electronic systems.
Quotes from the story:
• O’Reilly demonstrated his primary fear – almost panic – over the assumption that his medical records may not be private any more if President Obama passes some version of his healthcare bill. But enough with the foreplay -- O’Reilly dived right into his main fear. “My health records which are now in the hands of my private physician . . . they’re gonna be in Washington, right, so every malady that I have is gonna be seen by people in Washington. I don’t want that, do you want that?”
• After a little back and forth on the issue, O’Reilly repeated, “On a computer disk in D.C. will be what’s wrong with me . . . based on my medical history. It makes me very, very nervous.” Yes, we noticed.
• O’Reilly, again, focused worriedly on the privacy issue. “Let me ask you this,” O’Reilly posited. “It worries me that my medical history and your medical history is now gonna be on a disk in Washington, D.C., rather than the confidentiality of a doctor-patient, which we have had in this country for decades – that’s gone.”
• “The data is going to go to a bank in Washington, D.C.,” O’Reilly fretted. “ . . . I’m talking about you, Dr. Marc Lemont Hill, having a condition . . . with his program, it goes to D.C. and the bureaucracy decides how to treat you, not your physician. Doesn’t that worry you?”
• “So you don’t mind having your condition – whatever it may be – leave your doctor’s office and go to D.C. . . ,” O’Reilly said.
• O’Reilly hammered the privacy issue, once again, saying, “It’s going to a database that can be accessed . . . okay, if you don’t mind it, I do, and that’s a big concern of mine. We don’t have any privacy as it is in this country . . . .”
• Hill pointed out the bigger issue than the privacy of medical records (to most Americans, but not to O’Reilly) is 50 million uninsured Americans – and said that President Obama addressed that in the press conference.
• But the biggest question of all – what’s O’Reilly’s medical condition? The one O’Reilly is terrified might fall into the hands of the government? Is it really so awful that O'Reilly (not usually one to worry about privacy) is willing to kill health care reform just to protect it?
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
More than just google
In response to the Consumer Watch article: "U.S. Senate Records Reveal Google Inc. Lobbying Campaign On Personal Medical Records Law Despite Internet Giant's Denials"
This story is of interest because the public has no idea which corporations lobbied against their privacy rights in the stimulus bill or how much was spent overall to try to eliminate health privacy.
The focus on Google alone is misleading and actually distracts from the real work of informing the public about the major health-related industries that have long opposed Americans' privacy rights. The real question is which other industry giants that are not household names lobbied against privacy?
The total lobbying money spent by the massive secret health data mining industry, insurers, hospitals, and big Pharma to oppose Americans' rights to privacy far exceeds Google's lobbying expenses.
If we don’t know who all the culprits are, we can't stop them and restore privacy.
The most dangerous enemies of privacy are the ones we don’t know about.
This story is of interest because the public has no idea which corporations lobbied against their privacy rights in the stimulus bill or how much was spent overall to try to eliminate health privacy.
The focus on Google alone is misleading and actually distracts from the real work of informing the public about the major health-related industries that have long opposed Americans' privacy rights. The real question is which other industry giants that are not household names lobbied against privacy?
The total lobbying money spent by the massive secret health data mining industry, insurers, hospitals, and big Pharma to oppose Americans' rights to privacy far exceeds Google's lobbying expenses.
If we don’t know who all the culprits are, we can't stop them and restore privacy.
The most dangerous enemies of privacy are the ones we don’t know about.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
Is not just celebs who need strong security and privacy for PHI
'Smart' EHR software designed for security, privacy, and compliance with the law and ethics, would allow only those who have your informed consent to access your records. Staff and employees who carry out the orders of your attending physician could access your records under the informed consent you give your physician, by electronically affirming they are part of your treatment team. Instead of primitive, legacy EHR systems that allow 10,000 hospital staffers or employees access to your records, in a 'smart' EHR system only the 100 or so directly involved in your treatment could get into your PHI, preventing 9,900 snoopers' eyes from seeing anything.
Is not just celebs who need strong security and privacy for PHI--what about women whose abusers work for hospitals? What about all the minor local celebs? Do you want your nosy neighbor who is a clerk to be able to read your records?
Stepping up employee snooping via retroactive audits is EXTREMELY expensive (major hospitals have to have large technical staffs to be able to audits millions of accesses looking for those that should not have occurred). 'Smart' consent technologies exist. Retroactive audits for improper access are like looking for needles in a haystack UNLESS you are Nadya Suleman or some other celebrity whose EHR is being actively watched. Why not keep the horses from getting out of the barn in the first place?
Refer to COMPUTERWORLD story: "Kaiser fires 15 workers for snooping in octuplet mom's medical records".
Is not just celebs who need strong security and privacy for PHI--what about women whose abusers work for hospitals? What about all the minor local celebs? Do you want your nosy neighbor who is a clerk to be able to read your records?
Stepping up employee snooping via retroactive audits is EXTREMELY expensive (major hospitals have to have large technical staffs to be able to audits millions of accesses looking for those that should not have occurred). 'Smart' consent technologies exist. Retroactive audits for improper access are like looking for needles in a haystack UNLESS you are Nadya Suleman or some other celebrity whose EHR is being actively watched. Why not keep the horses from getting out of the barn in the first place?
Refer to COMPUTERWORLD story: "Kaiser fires 15 workers for snooping in octuplet mom's medical records".
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Job 1 for the AHIC successor? -- by Nancy Ferris
Notice how the for-profit research industry wants access "baked" into all EHRs up front for research uses, to avoid getting individuals' consents.
They call this a "value case" for the nation's electronic health system. What great Lakoffian re-framing and propaganda. How do you argue against "value"?
It’s a "value" alright, just not a "value" for patients, because it sets up a system that is both unethical (no consent) and illegal (violates Amercians' longstanding rights to privacy).
The story says the research industry wants open access to "de-identified" data, but that is NOT what they tell Congress or the regulators. They say they must have access to longitudinal data, which CANNOT be de-identified, because most research cannot be conducted using de-identified data.
The new AHIC 2 will be industry-driven and industry-paid for, with so-called "standards" being devised to meet the needs of corporations, not to adhere to the laws and ethics that governed the healthcare until the '90's and the advent of electronic systems for health data.
Today there are 'smart' technology solutions to make consent easy, cheap, understandable, and instantaneous (see the consents on HealthVault by application partners for a preview of how simple and clear and specific consents can be). Electronic consents can be interactive and actually explain things, rather than be densely written in legalese so no one understands them.
Why continue to use the kind of privacy-violating blanket coerced consents that were necessary in the paper health system? 'Smart' technologies can do a far better job. Using robust consent management tools, we can obtain valid and easy-to-understand specific, time-limited, and cheap consents from millions instantaneously.
View Full Article
They call this a "value case" for the nation's electronic health system. What great Lakoffian re-framing and propaganda. How do you argue against "value"?
It’s a "value" alright, just not a "value" for patients, because it sets up a system that is both unethical (no consent) and illegal (violates Amercians' longstanding rights to privacy).
The story says the research industry wants open access to "de-identified" data, but that is NOT what they tell Congress or the regulators. They say they must have access to longitudinal data, which CANNOT be de-identified, because most research cannot be conducted using de-identified data.
The new AHIC 2 will be industry-driven and industry-paid for, with so-called "standards" being devised to meet the needs of corporations, not to adhere to the laws and ethics that governed the healthcare until the '90's and the advent of electronic systems for health data.
Today there are 'smart' technology solutions to make consent easy, cheap, understandable, and instantaneous (see the consents on HealthVault by application partners for a preview of how simple and clear and specific consents can be). Electronic consents can be interactive and actually explain things, rather than be densely written in legalese so no one understands them.
Why continue to use the kind of privacy-violating blanket coerced consents that were necessary in the paper health system? 'Smart' technologies can do a far better job. Using robust consent management tools, we can obtain valid and easy-to-understand specific, time-limited, and cheap consents from millions instantaneously.
View Full Article
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