On its front page, the Boston Globe (6/21, A1, Kowalczyk) reports that shared electronic mental health records within Partners HealthCare system has raised privacy issues. According to Dr. David Blumenthal, Partners’ chief health information and innovation officer, “It’s one thing to give your psychiatrist the right to share your information [with certain doctors], it’s another to enter your data into a system that makes it available with relative ease to an unknown number of physicians who may be involved in your care … There are groups who are very uncomfortable with their records being shared with people they have not specifically designated.” Dr. JudyAnn Bigby, the state’s secretary of Health and Human Services, said the new health information exchange will share patient records online across clinicians, “but only with patients’ permission.”
Related Links:
— “As records go online, clash over mental care privacy, “Liz Kowalczyk, The Boston Globe, June 21, 2012.