The Health Care Blog

Medical Data in the Internet “Cloud” – Data Privacy

By ROBERT ROWLEY, MD The concepts of “security” and “privacy” of medical information (Protected Health Information, or PHI) are closely intertwined. “Security,” as described in the second part of this series, has to do with breaking into medical data (either...
September 27, 2009 in EHR, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (10)

HIPAA's Broken Promises

By SUSANNAH FOX If you hate HIPAA, it’s your lucky day. Paul Ohm is handing you ammunition in his article, “Broken Promises of Privacy: Responding to the Surprising Failure of Anonymization.” His argument: our current information privacy structure is a...
September 27, 2009 in HIPPA, HIT, Privacy, Susannah Fox | Permalink | Comments (19)

KP lawsuit doesn't sniff quite right

By Matthew Holt It’s about time we had a fun Kaiser Permanente scandal, as it’s been a while, and it appears that they’re having some influence on the side of the angels in DC these days. And tracking vis HISTalk...
August 14, 2009 in Health Plans, Policy/Politics, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (9)

The Red Flags Rule

By JOHN HALAMKA You may have seen the recent headlines "FTC delays Red Flags Rule implementation until August 2009". What is the Red Flags Rule and how does it relate to healthcare? The FTC has a great website that it...
May 19, 2009 in Hospitals, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (6)

Consumers Need All of the Facts in the Privacy Debate

By David St. Clair The economic stimulus package that President Obama has signed contains upwards of $20 billion to create electronic health records for most Americans within five years. The president has been very outspoken in his belief that EHRs...
February 26, 2009 in Privacy | Permalink | Comments (13)

A new national privacy and security framework for HIT

By Bob Coffield The Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONCHIT) issued a paper Monday called The Nationwide Privacy and Security Framework for Electronic Exchange of Individually Identifiable Health Information. The summary states that the framework creates...
December 16, 2008 in Electronic Medical Records, Privacy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (1)

Make your voice heard!

For the next week, you have a unique opportunity to make your voice heard on health information privacy issues, their impact on the Health 2.0 movement, and how best to build public trust in these technologies. The National Academy of...
October 28, 2008 in Electronic Medical Records, Health 2.0, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (2)

Google Health: Is It Good For You?

By AMY TENDERICH Note: Amy Tenderich, who writes and maintains the wonderful Diabetes Mine, just did this very illuminating interview with Google Health's Missy Krassner. As you'll see, she doesn't slow-pitch to Missy. This is a sure-footed, tough-minded exchange about...
October 7, 2008 in Google, Health 2.0, Marketplace, Online Communities, Privacy, Quality, Technology, The Industry, User Generated Content, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (2)

Consumer genetic movement: Cease and desist? How about understand and resist!

By Scott Shreeve I have been following health care consumerism for several years now. Particularly, the “Direct Access” or “Direct To Consumer” laboratory testing market. While analytic lab testing has led out in this area, genetic testing has received all...
July 2, 2008 in Consumers, Health 2.0, Policy, Privacy, Scott Shreeve | Permalink | Comments (1)

Snooping at Britney's Chart: Why Should Docs and Nurses Have Different Rules?

By Robert Wachter Should doctors and nurses be subject to different penalties for precisely the same infraction? Of course not. Are they? Sure. Just ask Britney Spears. Britney was hospitalized at UCLA at least twice in the past few years...
April 22, 2008 in Nursing, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (6)

Tune Into The Kroll Webcast On The Security of Patient Data - Brian Klepper

By Brian Klepper Exclusive to THCB: A couple weeks ago I pointed to a new study, commissioned by Kroll Fraud Solutions and conducted by HIMSS Analytics, that makes startlingly clear the gap between what most health systems are doing to...
April 22, 2008 in Brian Klepper, Electronic Medical Records, Privacy, The Industry | Permalink | Comments (0)

Medical Privacy: The Challenge of Behavioral Ad Targeting in Healthcare

By Jane Sarasohn-Kahn The latest piece in the medical privacy jigsaw puzzle is online behavioral advertising. Last week, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) received comments from the Network Advertising Initiative NAI on the agency's proposed principles for OBA. As part...
April 16, 2008 in Online Communities, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (4)

The Security of Patient Data

By Brian Klepper EXCLUSIVE TO THCB: HIMSS Analytics, the research arm of the powerful, thoughtful and highly regarded Health Information Management Systems Society, has published a sobering study, Security of Patient Data - see here - that highlights the gap...
April 8, 2008 in Brian Klepper, Electronic Medical Records, Health 2.0, Hospitals, Privacy, Technology, The Industry, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (3)

A Different Right to Privacy

By Eric Novack Given Matthew's quite visceral response to some complaints that broad-based, government-encouraged (mandated, I suspect), electronic medical records I am interested in both his and THCB readers' thoughts on the Bangor Daily News editorial staff's approach to health...
March 19, 2008 in Electronic Medical Records, Eric Novack, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (9)

HEALTH 2.0: Getting the PHR, Privacy and Deborah Peel issue off my chest

By Matthew Holt I’m a card carrying member of the ACLU. I oppose the Patriot Act. And I absolutely oppose the current Administration's decision to ignore the FISA law that already bends over backwards to help the government spy on...
March 13, 2008 in Health 2.0, Policy, Policy/Politics, Privacy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (12)

More on Google and the Cleveland Clinic

For a start, as I said in my last post and many times, and at least one of these commenters has written at length, the benefits of sharing health data in clinical situations massively outweigh the risk. So that should...
February 25, 2008 in Google, Privacy, Technology | Permalink | Comments (21)

Google, the Cleveland Clinic and the Privacy Zealots

So Modern Healthcare's Joseph Conn has a whole page to write about the Cleveland Clinic and he writes just about HIPAA and the fact that this pilot is not going to be covered by it. Writing in the San Francisco...
February 24, 2008 in Electronic Medical Records, Google, Privacy | Permalink | Comments (8)