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Power to the Patients?

By Dr. David Edward Marcinko; MBA, CMP™

[Publisher-in-Chief]

A common rallying cry of the turbulent sixties was “power to the people”. It embodied the zeitgeist of a generation that never seemed content until the democratizing electronic era emerged. In the healthcare space however, power still seems to rest in control of a select few; medical providers, employers, insurance companies, the government and other third-party intermediaries. Everyone, but the patient, until now!

And so, as a doctor, medical and nurse executive, health economists and scions of that era, the recent founding of Dossia.org, is particularly gratifying. Why? Because Dossia is an independent and nonprofit internet based platform that is personally controlled by patients, and patients alone? It is a voluntary, private, portable, secure, lifelong and decentralized repository of electronic medical information archived from many sources.

Early Adopters

Of course, as with any new technology, we wonder if patients and stakeholders are ready for it? Unfortunately, most are not; but increasingly more are. And, supporters of consumer directed healthcare, concierge medicine, marketplace competition, medical price transparency, retail clinics and the like, often respond in the affirmative. Therefore, allow us to ask if your clinic, facility, hospital or healthcare organization is aware and ready forDossia.org?

Inevitable

Ready or not, the promise of Dossia [or similar] is complete information about your patient’s medical history — information that they alone control — that will become available whenever needed: for routine office visits, away from home, in an emergency, for hospital admission or after a disaster that could destroy paper records. Dossia enables patients to become your active partner in their healthcare management. In short, it will allow them to:

• Share information with  doctors, clinics, outpatient centers, hospitals and healthcare systems
• Avoid delays, mistakes and miscommunication when more than one doctor is involved
• Help reduce medical communication errors and eliminate waste, costs and redundancy
• Help track, manage and treat chronic illnesses and enhance evidence-based best practices
• More effectively utilize physician and patient-provider face-time
• Help family members manage their health care; and more!

The key feature of Dossia is its personal and private nature. Only the patient is allowed to include or exclude information in a health record, and determine what parts will be shared with others. The patient will choose how much data is collected and how the record is shared – with whom – and in what form.

And, while we recommended patients share a complete medical history with their providers, the decision will always rest with them. Others can not access information without permission, including employers and insurance companies. 

Assessment

In brief, the mission of Dossia is nothing less than the complete transformation of health information technology, to reduce costs and improve quality, by developing a lifelong personal health record [LPHR].

Of course, the Dossia Founders Group is highly suited for this Herculean task. Thus far it includes: AT&T, Applied Materials, BP America, Inc., Cardinal Health, Intel Corporation, Pitney Bowes, sanofi-aventis and Wal-Mart. It is growing and has been endorsed by the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American Academy of Family Physicians, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC] and the National Association of Manufacturers. Initially, Founders will work with Children’s Hospital in Boston, and other qualified experienced vendors to develop and implement the Dossia Network infrastructure.  

Conclusion

And so, your thoughts on patient controlled eMRS are appreciated. Of course, regular readers of the Executive-Post know that according to the HIPAA statutes, patients have had similar medical records power for more than a decade now.

It’s just that the electronic platform seems to make it so much more appealing, doesn’t it; or is it the anytime-anywhere instantaneous nature of it all? Please opine.

Institutional: www.HealthcareFinancials.com 

Speaker: If you need a moderator or a speaker for an upcoming event, Dr. David Edward Marcinko; MBA – Editor and Publisher-in-Chief – is available for speaking engagements. Contact him at: MarcinkoAdvisors@msn.com or Bio: http://www.stpub.com/pubs/authors/MARCINKO.htm

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