Subscribe if you want to be notified of new blog posts. You will receive an email confirming your subscription.

Please enter your name.
Please enter a valid email address.

Please check the captcha to verify you are not a robot.

Something went wrong. Please check your entries and try again.

privacy

Stand for Quality Group: “Link HIT Investment to Quality Improvement”

On March 24, Stand for Quality — a new group representing 165 diverse health care organizations — called for a new era of quality in health care. Their white paper is titled Building a Foundation for High Quality, Affordable Health Care: Linking Performance Measurement to Health Reform .

The perspectives of Stand for Quality are a remarkable break from the past and have significant implications for future […]

Dorothy Tillman Update: Vindication!

About a year ago, we read about about Dorothy Tillman’s heroic efforts to get a copy of her aunt’s  medical records.

Here’s a recap:  On a Saturday evening Dorothy took her 86 year old aunt to a hospital in Montgomery, Alabama. Frustrated after an overnight stay in the ER which she said yielded “little treatment”, she requested a copy of her aunt’s medical records before leaving. When she was told that it was hospital policy to request records “in writing”, Dorothy escalated her […]

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 […]

Goldilocks: “Markle’s Framework for Networked Personal Health Information is Just Right”

By Vince Kuraitis and David C. Kibbe, MD, MBA

Once upon a time, there was a little girl named Goldilocks. Like most Americans, Goldilocks had concerns about achieving just the right amount of data liquidity for her personal health information (PHI).

Until today Goldilocks felt between a rock and a hard place:

"I want my PHI to be appropriately liquid — just the right viscosity. My PHI should be viscous enough to flow to my trusted […]

Is the Medical Establishment the Best Guardian of Your Medical Data?

David C. Kibbe, MD, MBA and Vince Kuraitis

Drs. Mandl and Kohane begin their recent article in NEJM with the statement that “large corporations are seeking an integral and transformative role in the management of health care information,” and then warn that this “will profoundly affect the biomedical research enterprise.”   

At issue for the authors is who controls the information about you and me, our health and healthcare data. Without coming right out and saying it directly, they worry that data in […]

Healthcare Informatics Webinar: Google, Microsoft, & Dossia Create the Personal Health Information Network

What are companies like Google, Microsoft, and Dossia (sponsored by Intel, Wal-Mart, AT&T and others) hoping to accomplish in health care?
What is the emerging Personal Health Information Network (PHIN) and why should you care?
What’s the Continuity of Care Record (CCR) Standard, and how is it destined to become an initial focal point of data exchange initiatives?
Why is the PHIN potentially disruptive to many business models? What types of companies or organizations could be affected the most?
What are opportunities and threats to major health care players — hospitals, […]

Search Engines Using Your Personal Health Information: Creepy or Cutting Edge?

When using a search engine, should results be customized based on your personal health information (PHI)?  Should your search engine of choice take into account your previous history of medical searches, or even provide results tailored from data about your personal medical history?

Two companies — Aetna and Microsoft — have come up with 180 degree different answers.

In this post, I will:

Describe how Aetna’s and Microsoft’s approaches differ
Speculate on why their approaches make strategic sense for the respective companies
Explore how technology and expectations about […]

Going to the Mat for Dorothy

by Jill Kuraitis 

Vince gave me Dorothy’s story to read, and here’s what I said:  GO DOROTHY!   ::::goofy little happy dance:::   Dorothy is my new hero. I love people who are willing to go to the mat for a cause, especially one having to do with the elderly, children, the disabled and less fortunate than we.

Since Vince and I have been overwhelmed by the swamp of details of taking care of our family elderly for about, oh, 13 years – my […]

Birth Announcement: the Personal Health Information Network (PHIN)

Vince Kuraitis and David C. Kibbe, MD MBA 

The Internet and digital technologies have transformed many aspects of our lives over the past twenty years.  We can get cash at ATMs all over the world; we can book our own airline reservations; we can shop and get best prices over the Internet.

Why hasn’t this happened in health care?  Something is missing.

Recently, major global information and communication companies have announced their intention to bring their technologies and business models to health care.  […]

A First Comparison of Google Health and MS HealthVault

While details are thin, here’s a first pass at comparing and contrasting Google Health (GH) and Microsoft HealthVault (HV).  Overall, there are many common features, some differences, and many common challenges between these two platforms. 

A High Level Comparison

Google Health and Microsoft HealthVault Personal Health Information (PHI) Platforms

There’s still not much information available about the specifics of GH, although they did release sketchy information on the Official Google Blog.  I’ll comment on a few of the particulars.