Digitizing medical records should never have been done. The reason is simple, anything digital, not matter what it is or where it’s at is subject to being hacked.
Worse, IMO, is that the can be CHANGED.
Orwell was very prophetic, and the Dems/libs are masters of 1984. How else could the party that overwhelmingly voted against significant civil rights legislation be the great guardians of minority rights? (in their estimation...)
Of course you are correct, however there is no way you can put the genie back in the bottle. America is no longer land or tangible things. America is now the cloud.
Normally I would agree with you.
And I would also add that the Obamacare requirement to go to medical records has caused many small practices to go out of business.
That said, in the past year my wife has been very ill with pancreatic cancer. She has had more scans, MRIs ultra sounds, tests, and surgeries in the past six months than most people will have in a year.
In the past tests would be repeated, lost, sent to the wrong place, and they would have added weeks to the process. And when dealing with PC, weeks in daignosis is the difference between living three weeks and five years.
In each case the subsequent doctor was able to access the entire medical record, tests, images, and diagnosis. Tests taken in different offices and through different labs can be viewed sequentially, identifying issues long before they would have shown up.
I understand the concern about hacking. I am sensitive to that. But I wanted to present a perspective where this “consolidation” of systems benefits a real life patient.
I worked for a health system where my wife is treated. 1/3 of that system is not on Epic. The other two thirds are. The two thirds that are are much more efficient and effective. I avoid having her go to the hospital where she still works (where I left in 2019) because it is a pain in the ass to coordinate care. And “our” hospital is ranked very high in individual care. They simply cannot “talk” to the other providers.
I love my digitized medical records.
I can go to my page and everything is there. Most important are all my lab results with tests too numerous to remember. For many of the tests there are graphs that present the trend.
Ditto all my medications and medication changes.
ditto appointments
ditto medical conditions
Judith Faulkner, CEO and founder of Epic, has a $4.3 billion net worth. She’s working on an “Alexa of medical records..” She says, “the doctor would just say, ‘hey, Epic, show me Lee’s history,’ and that would show up.” And at the end, the doctor would say, ‘hey, Epic, write my note,’ and the whole note would be written.”
Voice recognition in medical records has been around for years, but now Amazon is getting involved.