The new administration plans to spend 19 Billion, yes, big B, to accelerate the implementation and adoption of electronic medical records. As reviewed recently by the Technology section of the New York Times, the logic behind such a large expenditure is that electronic records can lower costs, increase safety and availability of the records and everybody eventually will benefit. Today’s reality is somewhat sobering, as per the article, only 17% of the doctors in the US utilize electronic record keeping, and those are mostly used in large medical institutions, so the vast majority of medical practices, up to 10 doctors, do not use any electronic, portable, medical records technology.
While the challenges to implementation are significant, what about privacy, portability, accuracy, backup, access control and dozens of factors that must be taken into consideration, I believe the impact of adoption standard and acceptable methodology will be extremely positive, not only on the cost control and fraud elimination but also on the clinical side as well. Our research centers will have statistical access to unprecedented wealth of empirical data, allowing medical decisions to be made based on huge segments of the population, ensuring diversity in research and treatment. The ability to create portable and interchangeable systems will allow patients to seek and get treatment across state lines; ensure complete medical history in case of accidents or medical emergencies while being away from home, etc.
As technologist, we see this trend as extremely interesting, since new products will have to be developed for authentication, encryption, safekeeping, backup, recovery, and storage in unprecedented capacity. At the same time, these may come in the form of portable storage devices, so you may be traveling with your complete medical history on a SIM card.
A complete new set of challenges will derive from the need to protect the data and block malevolent use of the information, as well as misuse by insurers, potential employers and anyone who may discriminate against a patient based on the context of the medical records. Are we up for the challenge? I think we are; this is the perfect opportunity to create new industries and services around this task.
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