Yesterday, I attended a hearing of the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics’s (NCVHS) Subcommittee on Privacy, Confidentiality, and Security. NCVHS is a major advisory committee to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and this hearing addressed developments in personal health records (PHRs) and related products or services. Along with other PHR vendors, Colin Evans, CEO of Dossia, testified about Dossia’s business model and how it is addressing privacy and security policies, along with changes posed by the stimulus bill, also known as the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act.
Dossia’s testimony before the Subcommittee can be found here:
HHS Dossia Testimony 5-8-09.doc. In sum, Dossia testified that (1) the U.S. healthcare system is inefficient and ineffective; (2) healthcare literacy is a critical part of driving down healthcare costs and improving the quality of care; (3) giving individuals access to their own personal and private health data will help them be better healthcare consumers; and (4) building trust and providing thoughtful and robust privacy and security functions into IT healthcare systems will drive adoption of the patient-driven model.
In his oral statement, Mr. Evans expressed his view that PHRs like Dossia are based on the assumption of much greater individual patient control over the flow of their information than was envisioned when HIPAA was created. He also stated that there needs to be consistency between the regulations and laws issues by HHS, the FTC, and the states.
Let us know what you think about Dossia’s testimony.
