Digital health records that are easily accessible by medical professionals and patients are slowly coming into existence. The network effect of this information sharing will lead to better tracking of medical conditions, better diagnosis by doctors who would have access to more complete information, and better patient self-care since they have more information about their health. This network will speed up the transfer of information from the old paper and mailing format; crucial information for surgeries and emergency treatment would be a click away.

Microsoft and the search engine giant, Google, have been competing to dominate this new personal health record market, but Microsoft was able to launch their system, HealthVault, first. It is stated in the article that the companies do not plan to make the ads (the money making part of this scheme) personalized to patient’s medical information. This is most likely due to customers not responding favorably to drug ads that targeted them, which seems to cross the line of privacy. An alternative system would be to have customers pay a subscription fee and have a site without ads. This may be a change from Google’s usual strategy of having large rich firms compete for ad space rather than have everyday people paying small amounts of money for a subscription. However, in addition to this fee Google can place a search engine function similar to its usual site, for curious customers to search about conditions, medications, and symptoms that they are worried about in their medical records.

A second problem with digital health records that are on the Web is the security risk. Currently, federal regulations such as HIPAA only govern how personal information is shared among health institutions and insurance companies, not companies like Google and Microsoft. The two companies claim that their site will allow individuals to decide who to share their information with and what type of information is shared. The threat of hackers is a constant issue for websites despites the companies’ claim of security. Critics fear that search engine ads may mislead patients with false advertisement to buy unnecessary treatments or trick patients into giving away their personal information.

All in all, this technology will revolutionize health care by facilitating the network and flow of medical information but the proper precautions and regulations must be set for the system to be reliable and safe for everyone.  

References

http://www.techcrunch.com/2007/10/04/microsoft-beats-google-to-online-health-records-with-healthvault/

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/17/business/17record.html?ref=health