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Project Nightingale

https://www.techtarget.com/searchhealthit/definition/Project-Nightingale

Excerpt:

.....How Project Nightingale works

Through Project Nightingale, Google is allowed access to the data of the Ascension healthcare network. In return, Ascension is provided access to any new software and services created by Google, such as its developing, centralized search tool that collects all PHI into one place and can be integrated into electronic health record (EHR) systems.

When Ascension patients check into their doctor’s office, hospital or senior care center, their examination results are entered into a computer by a doctor or nurse and then uploaded to Google’s cloud servers. This data is then used by Google to create new tools and software.

The access that Google has been granted amounts to the complete health records of over 50 million patients. The shared data includes the following:

patient names
patient birthdates
patient and family member addresses
lab results
diagnoses
hospitalization records
allergies
immunizations
medications
existing medical conditions
radiology scans

Concerns

Most of the concerns that have been raised about Project Nightingale focus on patient privacy. Ascension health care providers were not informed that the medical records of their patients were being distributed, and the patients never provided consent. Doubts have been raised regarding the security of the initiative and concerned individuals have questioned what precautions have been put in place to protect patients.

The lack of transparency creates the biggest ethical challenge for the Google-Ascension partnership. Some people don’t believe Google will use the collected PHI to cure diseases or improve the healthcare industry, and patients are upset by the inability to refuse involvement if they do not want their information shared.

Benefits

.....A concept that is gaining popularity in health IT is the learning healthcare system (LHS). LHS is a system that captures new knowledge and aligns science, incentives, culture and health informatics with continuous improvement and innovation, while also embedding best practices into delivery processes. LHSes have the potential to quickly learn from patient care data and use the gathered knowledge to improve future care. LHSes require sophisticated IT platforms that can pull knowledge from existing evidence and countless treatment records.

The expressed goals of Project Nightingale seem to align with the LHS concept. Therefore, tech advancements made through Project Nightingale could ultimately improve LHSes and advance overall patient care.

Another benefit of Project Nightingale is its potential to improve health equity. Minorities and pregnant women are often underrepresented in research studies. This has led to the concern that medical knowledge might not be as pertinent to these patients. Since Project Nightingale receives unfiltered data from a variety of Ascension patients, it has the potential to improve the knowledge of what treatments and procedures are most effective and safe for minority patient populations.

.....In 2018, Google and Ascension began work on Project Nightingale. The secret project remained hidden until Nov. 11, 2019, when The Wall Street Journal published an article revealing the existence of Project Nightingale.

A whistleblower also came forward soon after the Wall Street Journal article to warn that Project Nightingale gave Google employees access to confidential patient data. The whistleblower revealed that several Google employees involved in the project had already raised concerns about patient privacy.
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Patient equity right there reeks of political marxist ideology which would allow the patient data to be misused. Given what has happened with the Covid crapola the Goog and Ascension partnership can’t be trusted IMO.

Through Project Nightingale, Google is allowed access to the data of the Ascension healthcare network.

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What jumps to mind is their using the confidential patient info to identify nursing home patients and others who may be vulnerable to ballot theft.

Ascension health care providers were not informed that the medical records of their patients were being distributed, and the patients never provided consent.

When you sign a HIPAA agreement (as required by every doctor who takes money from the federal government), you are giving permission for the doctor to share your data with practically everybody but your family (which requires another document). The patients did give their mandated "consent".