The Hindu News Update Service
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Friday, February 22, 2008 : 0935 Hrs
Sci. & Tech.
Google to store patients' health records in test of new service
SAN FRANCISCO (AP): Google Inc. will begin storing the medical records of a few
thousand people as it tests a long-awaited health service that's likely
to raise more concerns about the volume of sensitive information entrusted to
the Internet search leader.
The pilot project announced Thursday will involve 1,500 to 10,000 patients at
the Cleveland Clinic who volunteered to an electronic transfer of their personal
health records so they can be retrieved through Google's new service, which
won't be open to the general public.
Each health profile, including information about prescriptions, allergies and
medical histories, will be protected by a password that's also required to
use other Google services such as e-mail and personalized search tools.
Google views its expansion into health records management as a logical
extension because its search engine already processes millions of requests from
people
trying to find about more information about an injury, illness or recommended
treatment.
But the health venture also will provide more fodder for privacy watchdogs who
believe Google already knows too much about the interests and habits of its
users as its computers log their search requests and store their e-mail
discussions.
Prodded by the criticism, Google last year introduced a new system that purges
people's search records after 18 months. In a show of its privacy commitment,
Google also successfully rebuffed the U.S. Justice Department's demand to
examine millions of its users' search requests in a court battle two years ago.
The Mountain View, California-based company hasn't specified a timetable for
unveiling the health service, which has been the source of much speculation
for the past two years. Marissa Mayer, the Google executive overseeing the
health project, has previously said the service would debut in 2008.
A Google spokesman declined to elaborate on the company's plans. The Associated
Press learned about the pilot project from the Cleveland Clinic, a
not-for-profit
medical center founded 87 years ago.
The clinic already keeps the personal health records of more than 120,000
patients on its own online service called MyChart. Patients who transfer the
information
to Google would still be able to get the data quickly even if they were no
longer being treated by the Cleveland Clinic.
``We believe patients should be able to easily access and manage their own
health information,'' Mayer said in a statement supplied by the Cleveland
Clinic.
The Cleveland Clinic decided to work with Google ``to create a more efficient
and effective national health care system,'' said C. Martin Harris, the medical
center's chief information officer.
Google isn't the first high-tech heavyweight to set up an online filing cabinet
in an effort make it easier for people to get their medical records after
they change doctors or health insurance plans.
Rival Microsoft Corp. last year introduced a similar service called
HealthVault, and AOL co-founder Steve Case is backing Revolution Health, which
also
offers online tools for managing personal health histories.
The third-party services are troublesome because they aren't covered by the
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA, said Pam Dixon,
executive director of the World Privacy Forum, which just issued a cautionary
report on the topic.
Passed in 1996, HIPAA established strict standards governing the privacy and
security of medical records. Among other things, the law requires a patient
to be notified when their records are being subpoenaed. The notice must be made
by the entity or person seeking the records so a patient has the opportunity
to fight the request.
That means a patient who agrees to transfer medical records to an external
health service run by Google or Microsoft could be unwittingly making it easier
for the government or some other legal adversary to obtain the information,
Dixon said.
If the medical records aren't protected by HIPAA, the information conceivably
also could be used for marketing purposes.
Google, which runs the Internet's most lucrative ad network, typically bases
its marketing messages on search requests and the content on Web pages and
e-mail contained in its computers.
It's not clear how Google intends to make money from its health service. The
company sometimes introduces new products without ads just to give people more
reason to visit its Web site, betting the increased traffic will boost its
profits in the long run.
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Sci. & Tech.
Google to store patients' health records in test of new service
SAN FRANCISCO (AP): Google Inc. will begin storing the medical records of a few
thousand people as it tests a long-awaited health service that's likely
to raise more concerns about the volume of sensitive information entrusted to
the Internet search leader.
The pilot project announced Thursday will involve 1,500 to 10,000 patients at
the Cleveland Clinic who volunteered to an electronic transfer of their personal
health records so they can be retrieved through Google's new service, which
won't be open to the general public.
Each health profile, including information about prescriptions, allergies and
medical histories, will be protected by a password that's also required to
use other Google services such as e-mail and personalized search tools.
Google views its expansion into health records management as a logical
extension because its search engine already processes millions of requests from
people
trying to find about more information about an injury, illness or recommended
treatment.
But the health venture also will provide more fodder for privacy watchdogs who
believe Google already knows too much about the interests and habits of its
users as its computers log their search requests and store their e-mail
discussions.
Prodded by the criticism, Google last year introduced a new system that purges
people's search records after 18 months. In a show of its privacy commitment,
Google also successfully rebuffed the U.S. Justice Department's demand to
examine millions of its users' search requests in a court battle two years ago.
The Mountain View, California-based company hasn't specified a timetable for
unveiling the health service, which has been the source of much speculation
for the past two years. Marissa Mayer, the Google executive overseeing the
health project, has previously said the service would debut in 2008.
A Google spokesman declined to elaborate on the company's plans. The Associated
Press learned about the pilot project from the Cleveland Clinic, a
not-for-profit
medical center founded 87 years ago.
The clinic already keeps the personal health records of more than 120,000
patients on its own online service called MyChart. Patients who transfer the
information
to Google would still be able to get the data quickly even if they were no
longer being treated by the Cleveland Clinic.
``We believe patients should be able to easily access and manage their own
health information,'' Mayer said in a statement supplied by the Cleveland
Clinic.
The Cleveland Clinic decided to work with Google ``to create a more efficient
and effective national health care system,'' said C. Martin Harris, the medical
center's chief information officer.
Google isn't the first high-tech heavyweight to set up an online filing cabinet
in an effort make it easier for people to get their medical records after
they change doctors or health insurance plans.
Rival Microsoft Corp. last year introduced a similar service called
HealthVault, and AOL co-founder Steve Case is backing Revolution Health, which
also
offers online tools for managing personal health histories.
The third-party services are troublesome because they aren't covered by the
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA, said Pam Dixon,
executive director of the World Privacy Forum, which just issued a cautionary
report on the topic.
Passed in 1996, HIPAA established strict standards governing the privacy and
security of medical records. Among other things, the law requires a patient
to be notified when their records are being subpoenaed. The notice must be made
by the entity or person seeking the records so a patient has the opportunity
to fight the request.
That means a patient who agrees to transfer medical records to an external
health service run by Google or Microsoft could be unwittingly making it easier
for the government or some other legal adversary to obtain the information,
Dixon said.
If the medical records aren't protected by HIPAA, the information conceivably
also could be used for marketing purposes.
Google, which runs the Internet's most lucrative ad network, typically bases
its marketing messages on search requests and the content on Web pages and
e-mail contained in its computers.
It's not clear how Google intends to make money from its health service. The
company sometimes introduces new products without ads just to give people more
reason to visit its Web site, betting the increased traffic will boost its
profits in the long run.
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