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personal health information

Is HITECH Working? #7: Where’s Plan B? Congress and ONC need to address major flaws in HITECH.

by Vince Kuraitis JD, MBA and David C. Kibbe MD, MBA

Pop quiz: Among early-stage companies that are successful, what percentage are successful with the initial business model with which they started (Plan A) vs. a secondary business model (Plan B)?

Harvard Business School Professor Clay Christensen studied this issue.  He found that among successful companies, only 7% succeeded with their initial business model, while 93% evolved into a different business model.

So let’s take this finding and reexamine our human nature. In light of these statistics, […]

Is HITECH Working? #4: While most attention has been focused on demand side incentives (will doctors and hospitals buy EHRs?), the supply (vendor) side of HIT is already transforming.

by Vince Kuraitis JD, MBA and David C. Kibbe MD, MBA

Most of the press coverage and attention to HITECH has been to the “buy” side of the market:  The central question here has been: “Will doctors and hospitals buy and use EHR technology?”

Meanwhile — and much more quietly — the sell (vendor) side of the EHR market is already dramatically different than it was a year ago. We observe change occurring at at least three levels:

HITECH […]

Privacy Law Showdown? Legal and Policy Analysis.

#2 in a series — Modifications to HIPAA Privacy Laws: Impact on Microsoft HealthVault, Google Health, and other PHRs. 

by Deven McGraw JD, MPH, Center for Democracy & Technology

Introduction

There has been considerable discussion lately about whether or not the stimulus legislation (ARRA) extends HIPAA coverage to commercial vendors of personal health records (PHRs) any time they contract with entities already covered by HIPAA like hospitals, health plans or physicians groups.  (For those of you who don’t know, HIPAA is the Health Insurance Portability and […]

Privacy Law Showdown? Setting the Stage

Today’s post is the first in a series entitled:

Modifications to HIPAA Privacy Laws: Impact on Microsoft HealthVault, Google Health, and other PHRs. 

We’ll explore how recent changes in privacy provisions of  ARRA/HITECH Federal stimulus legislation affect personal health information (PHI) platform companies (e.g., HealthVault, Google Health,  Dossia) and personal health record (PHR) companies.

Health IT expert and journalist Neil Versel described the issue in the April 7 issue of BNET Healthcare:

Although Google and Microsoft have gotten plenty of attention for their Web-based personal health records, both companies have long […]

Leavitt’s Framework Shoehorns the HIPAA Privacy Rule onto Your Personal Health Information

by Vince Kuraitis and David C. Kibbe MD, MBA

Have you ever heard anyone tell a happy story of how easy it is to get a copy of their paper medical records?

Departing Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt is laying the groundwork for this same story to apply to access to YOUR electronic personal health information.

Here’s an overview to what evolved into a long posting:

Analysis: The Leavitt Framework Uses the HIPAA Privacy Rule as a Baseline for Electronic Access to Personal Health Information
Implication: Extending […]

LifeCOMM: Will the Newest Personal Health Information Platform Play Nicely with Google and Microsoft?

Please read my guest post over at the Center for Connected Health .

Picturing the PHIN as One Interoperable Network

Will the Microsoft HealthVault, Google Health, and Dossia personal health information (PHI) platforms be able to exchange data?  In our introductory essay announcing the Birth of the Personal Health Information Network (PHIN), Dr. David Kibbe and I posed a critical question:

What will the PHIN look like?  Will there be multiple, non-interoperable, competing networks or just one interoperable network?

This question is being answered with the best possible answer:  the PHIN is evolving as one, interoperable network.

Consider 3 scenarios:

 

Scenario One: Status Quo — […]

Empowering Health IT for the Medical Home

by David C. Kibbe, MD MBA

The basic premise of the medical home concept is continuous, uninterrupted care that is managed and coordinated by a personal provider with the right tools that will lead to better health outcomes.

In 2007, the American Academy of Family Physicians, American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Physicians, and American Osteopathic Association, released the Joint Principles of the Patient-Centered Medical Home. In this document they state the characteristics of the Patient Centered Medical Home:

Personal Relationship
Team Approach
Comprehensive
Coordination
Quality […]

From PHRs to PHRSs

Personal health records (PHRs) are evolving toward becoming Personal Health Record Systems (PHRSs).

…that’s my key takeaway from attending the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Project Health Design (PHD) conference in Washington D.C. on September 17. The conference was entitled  A ‘Report Out’ from Project HealthDesign and Forum on Next-Generation PHRs .

A PHD Fact Sheet capsulizes the evolution from PHRs to PHRSs:

Heartburn Relief: UnitedHealth Joining Google Health and MSFT HealthVault?

From the August 6 edition of HISTalk — Healthcare IT News and Opinion:

"Re: UHG. Was at the Healthcare Quality Conference yesterday in Boston. Got to talking to a United Health exec who informed me that they have signed an agreement with Google Health and have a pending agreement with HealthVault. This backs up UHG’s previous statement that member records would be made portable. Individual made mention that the Google Health relationship extends beyond just claims records transfer and includes a […]