The topic I chose is from an article written on April 6th, 2009 in Business Week titled Putting Patient Privacy in Peril. This article talks about medical history in electronic form and patient privacy. Since 2003 hospital staff at UCLA medical facilities have inappropriately viewed over 1,000 people’s medical records. Most of the people whose records are being viewed and in some cases even sold to the press for large amounts of monetary compensation are celebrities. By 2014 with a new stimulus bill in place to financially encourage the medical sector it is hoped that all medical records in America will be digitalized which may lead to a further breach in privacy. "Our recovery plan will invest in electronic health records and new technology that will reduce errors, bring down costs, ensure privacy, and save lives," President Barack Obama told members of Congress on Feb. 24.
Right now certain sectors of government such as the Food and Drug Administration are already legally able to view any U.S. citizens medical records. The main goal of digitalizing medical information is to allow doctors to share health information among each other easily in order to better treat patients. The main worry that U.S. citizens have is that if insurance companies are able to get their hands on this information they may be able to discriminate against someone for their medical history or even discriminate against someone’s child who may have the genetics to inherit a certain condition. Under the new law customers would be able to ask that their medical information not be shared however this would only be a valid request if they pay for their treatment out of pocket in full which the majority of Americans are not able to do
In chapter four we read about information technology and privacy issues pertaining to information being so readily available in technological form. This article reminded me of chapter four because if all medical records were electronic there would be a higher risk of people hacking into the system and viewing records as well as hospitals and other medical facilities selling the sensitive information to make profit without the regard for patients and their privacy. Though there are benefits to this new plan, which will allow doctors to easily and quickly view many medical records with a click of the mouse it may cause more harm then help if information is being compromised and gets into the wrong hands.
Works Cited
King, Rachael. (April 6, 2009). Putting Patient Privacy in Perill. Retrieved April 12, 2009, fromhttp://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/apr2009/tc2009046_128156.htm
What I find interesting is that to a certain degree, there really is no such thing as privacy. I mean, everytime you apply for schools, credit cards, or anything else, you are always asked for your social security number and all kinds of personal information. So sometimes I wonder if there really is such a thing as privacy.
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting article...what I am wondering is do people actually lie to insurance companies, is that why they are frightened that they will gain access to their medical history? I would assume insurance companies request that type of information and supporting proof when you apply.