Dan L

I have to disagree with your labeling, though. HealthVault, Google, and Dossia really aren’t PHR’s at all. Even these companies don’t really consider themselves to be PHR’s. PHR’s are a set of API’s, and consumer directed tools and interfaces, like you see with iHealth, ActiveHealth, HealthTrio, and the myrad of other smaller PHR vendors that are out there (By the way, that isn’t an endorsement of any of these particular PHR systems, just a list of examples). A simplified definition of a PHR’s primary intention is, “to make it easy for patients to interact productively with their healthcare information”.

Tools like Dossia, HealthVault and GoogleHealth are “repository systems”, or “Health Record Banks”. There’s a VERY limited segment of consumers out there that will interact with their healthcare data directly through HealthVault with any kind of frequency that would be beneficial. It’s just not a user friendly interface, and it lacks the value services that the majority of consumers need to engage with. It was designed to be that way. Microsoft isn’t interested in making HealthVault pretty to consumers. They’re interested in partnering with other people who can provide the PHR component. The main value of HRB’s or repositories is to provide connectivity (and secondarily storage capacity for smaller institutions that can’t cost effectively maintain their own servers, etc).

Patient Portals are a much broader group of services, provided by health organizations, in which patients have access to “below-the-log-in” data, whether this is licensed health education content, billing inormation, or other health related services. PHR’s are often part of the suite of services offered from within a patient portal, and some PHR vendors are even starting to create pre-fabricated patient portal services that healthcare institutions can buy as a sort of “plug-and-play” solution, they aren’t the same thing as a PHR.

Just a note to express sadness and sympathies for your loss. Be well.
Mike H

Our prayers are with the family. There are many, many things that are considerably more important than this wired world we all now inhabit 24/7. Friends and family in a time of need are at the top of the list.

The world can wait. Indeed, there is probably no greater sorrow than for a parent to bury a child.

Check out http://www.HealthUnity.com
They have some great deployments of health information exchange.

Daniel

If you do wish to repost, please keep it above board and be reflective of the broader issues that pertain to a citizen’s control of their medical records.