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Internet Could Organize Medical Records
Internet Could Organize Medical Records
NEW YORK (Reuters) -- When an unconscious patient is wheeled
into an emergency room of a major urban hospital, how quickly can a
doctor find the patient's medical records to assure better treatment?
"It definitely takes a while," Dr Juan Sinistera said from the ER of
Lincoln Hospital in the Bronx section of New York City. "In a large
hospital like we have here, it's very busy.
And if a patient is just a passer-by, it is a big problem." But a
potential
cyber-solution looms as a host of companies, such as DrKoop.com Inc.
and PersonalMD.com, scramble to harness the Internet to round up
scattered personal medical records and bring new efficiency to the life
and death world of medicine.
The market could be huge, the companies say, potentially including just
about everyone who has any kind of a health care paper trail anywhere
in the United States, or even the world.
But Internet analysts warn that moving medical records to cyberspace
may be easier said than done -- not only due to the daunting logistics,
but perhaps more importantly, because some people fear cyberspace
affords none of confidentiality of a doctor's filing cabinet.
"Confidentiality would definitely be an issue," said Dr.
Cynthia Devivo at Columbia-Presbyterian Hospital in New York.
It is also unclear how such businesses can turn a profit, though some
are
trying to find a way to tap the market.
"There are quite a few people working on this," said Guy MacNeill, vice
president for marketing at Drkoop.com Inc., a medical Web site
founded by former US Surgeon General C.
Everett Koop. "We actually have been working on this project for a
while." The self-described pioneer in the field, PersonalMD.com, is
getting a taste of the challenges that lie ahead.
It knows, for example, that more than 10,000 people have signed up for
its free service in the last few months, but as part of the
confidentiality it
offers, it has no way of knowing how often, if at all, those record are
accessed.
To set up an account, people can fax their records to the California
company, which then puts them online and sends back a card with an
individual access code on it.
The records can then be retrieved either on the Internet on
http://www.personalmd.com or through an automated fax-back system,
both of which require the individual access code.
In the rush and stress of an emergency room, such access could literally
mean the difference between life and death, said Dr. Scott Plantz, chief
executive officer of Emedicine.com, which publishes medical textbooks
online.
While Plantz, who is also vice president of the American Academy for
Emergency Medicine, is not part of PersonalMD.com, he is keen on
linking the company's records service to his own company's Web site,
http://www.emedicine.com
PersonalMD.com has been in business for a year and a half, providing
medical news and health tips on the Internet, but it launched its
medical
records service only in March after its top executive recognized market
potential.
"Even large HMOs don't have medical records stored in any simple
place," Suresh Challa, PersonalMD.com's president and chief executive,
said in a recent interview.
Challa is optimistic about his company's prospects, saying even a friend
is using the service to show an American doctor the medical records of
is sick mother in India.
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