MI5 News and Updates

Personal Web Records – Benefit or Liability?

Personal Health Records (PHR) are a handy way for patients to keep track of their medical information. PHRs can benefit everyone, but they are especially useful to those who see many different doctors and take several medications at one time. Doctors may not be aware of every medication their patients take if their patients see many different specialists. Personal health records help break down these information silos and give each physician better information about their patient.

Medicare allows its beneficiaries to store their health records online with one of four companies: Google Health, HealthTrio, NoMoreClipboard.com, and PassportMD. Web based services are handy because the patient can access them from anywhere with an internet connection, and they do not have to worry about carrying around a small USB drive. Many of these web-based PHRs offer additional services, such as interfaces to pharmacy data, drug interaction databases, and diet tracking tools.

While handy, web-based PHRs have a couple of drawbacks. First, they are out on the internet, so security is not guaranteed. Just like online banking, web-based PHRs usually have pretty robust security. The weakest link is usually the passwords users choose to protect their accounts. State of the art encryption and best practices count for nothing if patients use a password that an attacker can easily guess. Furthermore, there are many incidents where hospitals have leaked patient information onto the internet because their web servers were miss-configured.

Second, you need an internet connection to access your data. If you are on vacation, on the road, or anywhere without connectivity, your data is inaccessible. This may not seem like a big deal, but consider what would happen if you are in an accident. USB-based PHRs are instantly available to any EMT or emergency worker. They can access your health records almost instantly. This is not possible with a web-based PHR.

USB-based PHRs are a better choice, because the patient carries them at all times. XLEMR’s PHR, the Medical Information 5 card, is contained in a slim USB drive that fits in your wallet. Robust military-strength AES encryption protects sensitive health documents should the card be lost or stolen.

Personal health records are a great way for patients to keep track of their information, but they must keep security in mind. Patients have to strike a balance between safety and fast access to information with their privacy and security. That is a decision only the patient can make.

Indian study on PHR use in schools

Personal health records are not just limited to the United States. Many countries around the world are already using PHRs. India, for example uses PHRs for their school children. The article listed below discusses some strategies for using and improving PHRs in Indian schools.

A Comparative Study of the Health Record Cards in Primary Schools of Delhi.

Handa A, Gupta S, Tiwari VK. School Health Services, MCD, Delhi, Department of Community Health Administration, and #Department of Planning and Evaluation, National Institute of Health and Family Welfare, Delhi, India. Correspondence to: Dr Ajay Handa, GDMO I, School Health Services, Shahadra South Zone, MCD Delhi. ajhanda67@yahoo.com.

A comparative study was undertaken to understand the various measures required to strengthen and improve the health record cards (HRC) of various schools that subsequently help in improving the medical examination of children. By using a multi stage stratified random sampling method, 24 schools from Delhi, eight each from three broad categories of (i) corporation schools, (ii) other government schools, (iii) private schools were included in the study. The study finding revealed that in most of the government schools the health record cards were properly developed and structured as per the recommendations of various committee, though they are always in short supply.

PMID: 19029568 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher]

Personal Health Records could save US Billions

The Center for Information Technology Leadership (CITL) conducted a study on the value of personal health records (PHRs), and determined the United States could save $21 billion each year at the national level. The study assumes a ten year role-out and 80% nationwide usage. CITL presented their findings at the American Informatics Association annual symposium in Washington, DC.

The study explored four PHR architectures: provider-tethered, payer-tethered, third party, and interoperable PHR systems. The architectures support information collection and sharing with authorized parties, information for self-management, and health information exchange. CITL finds the greatest benefits would come from deploying interoperable PHRs to 80% of the US population.

Provider-tethered PHRs are supplied and managed by the patient’s physician. This type of PHR is tied into the provider’s medical record database. Payer-tethered PHRs are managed by insurance companies and connected to their administrative databases. Third-party PHRs aggregate healthcare data for users via manual data exchange. Interoperable PHRs use regional aggregation of patient’s data via standards-based automated data exchange.

Regardless of the architecture, “PHRs have the potential to dramatically improve efficiencies in our healthcare system,” according to Dr. Blackford Middleton, Chairman of CITL. Their research also finds that the “benefits and annual savings far outweigh the costs” of implementing PHRs. Finally, CITL states that benefits from PHRs could accrue to both payers and providers.

XLEMR is developing a PHR based on their electronic medical record paired with the Walletex USB flash drive. XLEMR offers a custom system based on Microsoft Office, allowing easy data storage on USB devices. The Walletex flash drive is a slender USB drive the size of a credit card that fits in one’s wallet.

Read the article.

Ryan Ricks
Security Officer
www.XLEMR.com