BASS & JOHNSON: Time to act on health IT

The privacy issue is huge-this piece glosses over it. The number of people who will have access-providers and any number of insurance administrative staff-will make it nearly impossible to track who, of the many with authorized access, improperly discloses. A national database will benefit insurers/gov't looking to keep tabs on people more than local providers.

I admit that I giggled a little when I read Bass and Johnson’s claim that security and privacy of electronic health records are superior to paper records. They write: “A paper-based system contains very little real privacy protections. It is impossible for a patient to even know when someone has reviewed his or her medical file. A patient's private records could be looked at, copied and returned to the paper file without anyone else knowing.” Their statement is so rich in sincere self-deception that it is easily mistaken as sarcasm. OK. I’ll play. (This is just too easy): How long would it take to look at, copy and return a paper file, and do either of you think someone might notice? Now, how long would it take to download a million of them off of a breached computer? Do you think anyone would notice? Let me be the first to point out further weakness in the authors’ knowledge of their subject: If audit trails are so handy for detecting who, when and where someone even attempts to access a patient’s electronic records - as you say - please tell me this: Who has accessed the 230 million or so electronic records that have been breached in the last 3½ years? (http://www.privacyrights.org/ar/ChronDataBreaches.htm#CP) I also noticed that the Bass and Johnson writing duo still lean on the long-ago discredited and not-so-independent Rand study. I think even healthcare IT rookies no longer make that mistake. Where have Charles F. Bass and Nancy Johnson been for the last three years? Darrell Pruitt DDS cc: spamgroup

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